Overview

• Attackers in two pickup trucks opened fire with pistols and rifles outside a liquor store, killing 15 people and wounding 14 before shooting two more victims at a second location.
• Among the dead was a child who ran more than a kilometer after being shot before collapsing.
• Witnesses reported the assailants shouting “Active Wolves”, a slogan linked by police to the Los Lobos gang.
• Ecuador recorded over 4,000 homicides in the first five months of 2025, averaging more than one killing per hour as rival gangs dispute drug trafficking routes.
• Ecuador’s ports now handle more than 70 percent of global cocaine exports, intensifying clashes between rival cartels vying for control of transit corridors.