A riot at a prison in Machala, Ecuador, resulted in the death of 31 inmates, most of them by asphyxiation. The incident was caused by the reorganization of inmates.

On Sunday, a violent riot in the prison of the port city of Machala, Ecuador, resulted in the deaths of at least 31 inmates, according to the penitentiary agency SNAI. Among them, 27 died from asphyxiation, while others were reported as immediate deaths by hanging. The riot was triggered by a reorganization of inmates into a new maximum-security unit. SNAI previously reported four deaths in the same prison, an incident that was controlled by tactical police. Ecuador has experienced a series of riots in prisons in recent years, resulting in hundreds of deaths, and the administration of President Daniel Noboa has attributed the violence to rivalries between gangs for territorial control. These events highlight the security crisis in the Ecuadorian penitentiary system.