“Police from Ecuador forcibly entered our embassy and detained the former vice-president of that country who was a refugee and processing asylum due to the persecution and harassment he faces,” President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador wrote on social media platform X (formerly Twitter).
“This is a flagrant violation of international law and the sovereignty of Mexico.”
Ecuador regains control of prisons amid war on drug gangs
Ecuador regains control of prisons amid war on drug gangs
Foreign minister Alicia Barcena later wrote on X that Mexico had decided on “the immediate breaking of diplomatic relations with Ecuador.”
Ecuador’s presidential communications department said in a statement that Glas, who has been “sentenced to imprisonment by the Ecuadorian justice system, has been arrested tonight and placed under the orders of the competent authorities.”
Glas was released from prison in November after serving time for corruption in a vast scandal involving the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.
He faces another arrest warrant for allegedly diverting funds that were intended for reconstruction efforts after a devastating earthquake in 2015.
On Friday, Mexico had complained of “harassment” due to an increased police presence outside its Quito embassy.
“This is what fascists are like,” Lopez Obrador said at his daily news conference.
Ecuador had earlier declared Mexican ambassador Raquel Serur “persona non grata”.
Experts watching the arrest pointed out the act was bold violation of the Vienna Conventions on Consular Relations, something that is likely to put a firm wedge between the governments of Mexico and Ecuador.
“This is not possible, it cannot be, this is crazy,” said Roberto Canseco, head of the Mexican consular section in Quito, outside the embassy.
Lopez Obrador said violence and “manipulation” by some media caused a drop in the popularity of leftist candidate Luisa González and the rise of Noboa.
The Ecuadorian government criticised his comments as offensive and said the country was still in “mourning” for Villavicencio, a fierce opponent of corruption.
Until a few years ago, Ecuador was considered an island of peace surrounded by major cocaine producers Peru and Colombia, but today it is also plagued by gang violence linked to the drug trade.