MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Mexico to bring Quito Embassy case before the ICJ

Our diplomatic staff returns home with their heads held high, Bárcena posted on X

After successfully pulling out of Ecuador all 18 members of its diplomatic mission following the breakup after Quito's unlawful actions at the Mexican Embassy in Quito, the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) announced Sunday that a case would be filed before the International Court of Justice in The Hague (The Netherlands) first thing Monday.

 The Mexican diplomats boarded a commercial flight after sending an Air Force transport aircraft was ruled out to avoid deepening the current tensions.

Foreign Minister Alicia Bárcena also said she hoped the international community would condemn the Ecuadorian government's actions to arrest former Vice President Jorge Glas, who had been granted asylum as he faced corruption charges.

Bárcena also said that the violent raid ordered by President Daniel Noboa is an unprecedented event and must be condemned by the international community. ”Not even the dictator (Augusto) Pinochet (1973-1990) had dared to enter the Mexican Embassy in Chile,“ she stressed.

Mexico's displaced ambassador to Ecuador Raquel Segura stressed that President Daniel Noboa ”was wrong to make a decision that not only breaks international conventions“ and insisted that the government in Quito ”believed that the Mexican State would act as they would, but we are not the same.”

Agradecida por el acompañamiento de embajador@s de ,,, y el pres. de la Cámara Ecuador-México.
Nuestro personal diplomático deja todo en y regresa a casa con la frente y el nombre deen alto tras asalto a nuestra Embajada.
Gracias amigos y aliados x su solidaridad. pic.twitter.com/893UgDuXzt

— Alicia Bárcena (@aliciabarcena) April 7, 2024

Mexican diplomat Roberto Canseco showed the signs he had after being beaten when trying to prevent the Ecuadorean police from raiding the Embassy.

“Our diplomatic staff leaves everything in Ecuador and returns home with their heads and the name of Mexico held high after the assault on our embassy,” Bárcena also posted on X.

Serur was declared “persona non grata” by Quito after statements from AMLO regarding the elections that led Noboa to power.

Spain and the European Union joined the international community's rejection of Quito's actions.

Glas, who served as vice president under Rafael Correa between 2013 and 2018 had been taking refuge in the Mexican mission since December claiming to be politically persecuted.

According to AMLO, the murder of presidential candidate Federico Villavicencio created a “rarefied atmosphere of violence” which caused the fall in the polls of Correist candidate Luisa Gonzalez and the rise of Daniel Noboa, who justified the storming of the embassy citing an alleged “abuse of the immunities and privileges” granted to the diplomatic mission. On Saturday, Ecuador's Foreign Minister Gabriela Sommerfeld justified the move saying there was “a real risk of imminent flight” of Glas.

Glas, 54, was transferred Saturday to a maximum security prison in Guayaquil (southwest) known as “The Rock.”

Correa, exiled in Belgium since 2017 and sentenced in absentia to eight years in prison for corruption, described Friday's events as “madness” and said on X that Glas “has difficulty walking because he was beaten.”

Mexico announced that the embassy in Quito would remain closed indefinitely and that the nearly 1,600 Mexicans residing in Ecuador could be assisted through the Registration System for Mexican Persons Abroad (Sirme), as well as in embassies of nearby countries such as Chile, Colombia, and Peru.

Mexico and Ecuador established diplomatic relations in 1830. Ecuador was seeking a visa-free agreement while negotiating its entry into the Pacific Alliance.

“Mexico reiterates its condemnation of the violation of the immunity of its Embassy in Quito and the aggression against its personnel,” a statement from Mexico's Foreign Ministry also read.

In Mexico City, a group of some 100 people protested Saturday in front of Ecuador's Embassy in the Polanco neighborhood calling Noboa's administration officials “fascists” and “terrorists.”