The National Government today denied having any responsibility for the escape of a former Ecuadorian minister convicted of corruption, who remained in asylum at the embassy in Quito. The spokesperson for the Presidency considered that the case does not affect the “brotherly” relations between the two countries.
«How are you going to favor the transfer? Please!“Gabriela Cerruti responded, when asked regarding the former Ecuadorian high-ranking official María Ángeles Duarte, who last Friday left the residence of the Argentine ambassador to travel to Venezuela.
“The Argentine government has nothing to do with security issues in Ecuador, how it happened is beyond us“, the official pointed out.
Ecuador, through its foreign minister Juan Carlos Holguín, expressed that there was “complicity” of the Argentine diplomatic representation in Duarte’s flight and declared ambassador Gabriel Fuks persona non grata. The Argentine government, in turn, responded with a request for the Ecuadorian diplomat Xavier Monge to leave Argentina.
Diplomatic relations remained at the level of charge d’affaires
«Relations with Ecuador are not suffering any type of conflict“Cerruti maintained despite the tension between the two South American nations. “This situation is specific and has nothing to do with relations between the two countries, which we all know are relations of closeness and brotherhood.”
Duarte entered the residence of the Argentine ambassador in August 2020 to avoid serving an eight-year prison sentence following being convicted of being part of an organization that investigators say collected some $7.3 million in bribes from public works contractors.
She entered that residence accompanied by a minor son, whose father is Argentine. She was accepted for humanitarian reasonsas reported at the time.
Argentina reported in December that it granted her asylum for humanitarian reasons and that it hoped to receive a safe-conduct from the Ecuadorian government for the former minister to travel to the airport, which neutralized the arrest warrant once morest her. But that did not happen and she remained in the ambassador’s residence, in the north of Quito.
Cerruti explained that “The issue had already been unresolved for some time. The Argentine Foreign Ministry had acted before international organizations such as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and had asked the Ecuadorian government to resolve this situation.«.
The Argentine Foreign Ministry reported Tuesday in a statement that Duarte had appeared before its embassy in Caracas. He explained that he made inquiries regarding Argentine documentation procedures, but clarified that the former official stated that he has no intention of traveling to Argentina. “in the short term”.
“It is a matter of discussion with the beloved Ecuadorian nation that hopefully passes quickly and we can find a solution,” the spokeswoman concluded.
The scandal over an alleged confession
The Infobae site reported yesterday on an alleged call between President Fernández and Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Juan Carlos Holguín, where the president would have revealed that the The escape of the former minister of Rafael Correa was planned from Caracas under the responsibility of Óscar Laborde, Argentine ambassador in Venezuela.
This is what Holguín would have commented on “off” before the Oversight Commission of the Ecuadorian Congress. There would lie the malaise of the South American country that precipitated the expulsion of the Argentine ambassador.
With information from AP and Infobae
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