QUITO: Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa said Thursday that an unknown assailant had attempted to poison him with chocolate and a jam laced with chemicals, gifted to him at a public event.<\/p>\n
Noboa told CNN the presence of three \u201chighly concentrated\u201d toxic substances in the sweets \u201ccould not have been accidental,\u201d saying his team had proof to back up his claims.<\/p>\n
The 37-year-old president said the toxic substances could not have come from the products themselves or their packaging.<\/p>\n
The military body responsible for his security detail had filed a complaint with prosecutors.<\/p>\n
It is the second time that Noboa\u2019s administration has alleged an attempt on his life, amid Indigenous anti-government protests and spiralling crime.<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, the government said that Noboa\u2019s vehicle bore bullet marks after his motorcade was set upon by a group of stone-throwing protesters angry about rising fuel prices.<\/p>\n
Defense Minister Gian Carlo Loffredo called it an \u201cassassination attempt.\u201d<\/p>\n
No evidence was presented from the scene, such as bullet casings. Noboa emerged unscathed.<\/p>\n
The country\u2019s largest organization of Indigenous peoples, called Conaie, have blocked roads \u2014 including in the capital\u2019s Pichincha province \u2014 since September 22 over mounting fuel costs.<\/p>\n
Some experts have suggested that Noboa\u2019s allegations about attempts on his life could be a way to portray the protesters as violent to boost his political fortune.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo one throws a Molotov cocktail at themselves…or poisons themselves with chocolate, or throws stones at themselves,\u201d Noboa said.<\/p>\n
The president is preparing for a November 16 referendum which he hopes will pave the way for him to draft a constitution that is tougher on drug-related crime.<\/p>\n
Ecuador, once one of Latin America\u2019s safest countries, has become a key cocaine transit hub between top producers Colombia and Peru, and consumers around the world.<\/p>\n
Murder rates have soared, while car bombings, assassinations and prison massacres have become routine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
QUITO: Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa said Thursday that an unknown assailant had attempted to poison him with chocolate and a jam laced with chemicals, gifted to him at a public event. Noboa told CNN the presence of three \u201chighly concentrated\u201d toxic substances in the sweets \u201ccould not have been accidental,\u201d saying his team had proof …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":88633,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-88619","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88619"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88619\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88634,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88619\/revisions\/88634"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}