What has caused criminal violence to surge in Ecuador?

What has caused criminal violence to surge in Ecuador?
Soldiers patrol outside the government palace during a state of emergency in Quito (Dolores Ochoa/AP)

Some attacks by armed men, notably an audacious attack on a television station during a live broadcast, have shone a light on Ecuador’s spiralling violence in the wake of an apparent recent prison escape.

The imprisoned leader of a drug gang mysteriously vanished from his cell in the coastal city of Guayaquil on Sunday, prompting the government to declare a state of emergency.

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