US EditionFive human heads found hanging on a beach in southwestern Ecuador
The heads were a warning against fishermen extorted for 'vaccine cards' amid violent disputes over drug trafficking routes, with 2025 being Ecuador's deadliest year on record.
- On Sunday, police found five human heads hung on display at a tourist beach in Puerto López, Manabí province, Ecuador, with images showing the heads tied with ropes on wooden posts.
- Police said the display was linked to a conflict between criminal groups contesting territory in Manabí province and a wooden board warned alleged extortionists demanding `vaccine cards` from fishermen.
- Police on Saturday had stepped up controls in Puerto López after a massacre two weeks earlier, but those controls failed to prevent this incident amid Ecuador’s most violent year with over 9,000 homicides.
- The display threatens public safety and local tourism in Puerto López, a popular whale-watching destination, while President Daniel Noboa vowed to confront expanding criminal organisations linked to drug cartels.
- Ecuador has become a logistical centre for drug routes, engulfed for more than four years in violence as transnational cartels use local fishermen and small boats for trafficking.
75 Articles
75 Articles
Five severed heads hung with wooden pole ropes, exposed on the sand of a beach frequented by swimmers and fishermen. It is the scene that was found in front of Sunday morning the inhabitants of Puerto López, a town on the peaceful coast of Ecuador, become one of the symbols of violence linked to drug trafficking. The BBC reports it, citing sources of the police and local media. Next to the human remains a sign was found with an explicit message:…
Five human heads were found hanging from ropes on a beach in Puerto Lopez, Ecuador. Police attribute the bloody scene to a conflict between criminal gangs involved in drug trafficking. The country is currently experiencing a wave of violence, with states of emergency declared in some areas, and our Foreign Ministry is advising against travel to certain areas.
"The city belongs to us: On a tourist beach unknown people show five human heads. On a wooden board gang members are threatened.
The police in Ecuador made a particularly gruesome find on a tourist beach. Five heads were placed on a wooden post.
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- 37% of the sources are Center, 36% of the sources lean Right
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