Quito, Ecuador – Feb.2, 2004

Gunmen opened machine gun fire on Leonidas Iza, the president of Ecuador’s national indigenous federation (CONAIE) and his family in Quito on Sunday night of February 1, injuring two of his sons, his wife and his nephew in what has been called a politically motivated assassination attempt.

¨This was not a common criminal act but one with political motives,¨ Gilberto Talahua said, the Coordinator of the Pachakutik movement, a national indigenous political organization.

“There is a pattern”, said Talahua. And that is in the form in how the hired assassins behaved. Their calculated moves are similar to secret organizations or paramilitary groups, typical in countries in war or under military dictatorships, or repressive governments.

Also, there was a premeditated plan. The criminals knew that Iza was not in the country, since he was participating in the third Hemispheric Forum against the FTAA, taking place in Havana, Cuba from January 26 to the 29th. The president of CONAIE participated and was chosen as leader by the organizing committee to make the final declaration speech of the event.

The criminals were well informed of the itinerary of the president of CONAIE, and began following him as soon as he arrived at the airport and had taken a taxi with his wife, his daughter, and the coordinator of the Pachakutik Movement, Gilberto Talahua.

The hired assassins took their time in waiting for Iza and his family to get out of the taxi, in which Talahua remained and went on his way.

Once on their own, while they waited for the main door of CONAIE headquarters to be opened, the assassins got out of a red coloured car, with license plates PDB 178, they showed their weapons and shouted at Iza, ¨we´re going to kill you, you son of a bitch,¨ and they tried to force their way into CONAIE´s headquarters. However, Iza’s family members were able to hold the door shut, so they unloaded their guns on the metal door.

Iza´s son was caught in the gun fire and has suffered severe

damage to his internal organs by the 9 mm bullets. His brother Rodrigo Iza, 32, and his nephew Daniel Tixe,19, were shot in the legs and feet.

After running out of bullets, the hired assassins beat Iza’s wife in the face with their guns. She was carrying her 2-year-old daughter on her back during the attack. The fact that the president

of the CONAEI was unhurt during the attack was thanks

to one of this family members who threw him to the floor

where the bullets could not reach him.

With this act, violence symptomatic of state terrorism is establishing itself in Ecuador. From December until now there have been cases of repression against the Sarayacus people of the Amazon, the arbitrary and illegal detainment of the president of ECUARUNARI, Humberto Cholango, the repression of the demonstration on International Day of Human Rights, and the latest is the assassination of Patricio Campana, a Petrocomercial worker who was investigating the theft of oil from the state oil company.

It is important to note that the indigenous movement is one of the main opposition forces against president Lucio Gutierrez’s regime and his neo-liberal policies.

The CONAIE has declared itself against the government’s

sell-out agenda to the IMF, and it has also rejected

Plan Colombia, the FTAA and the Bilateral Agreements

which Ecuador’s government wants to sign with the United States

of America.

Finally, Leonidas Iza has expressed that

the people of Ecuador should demand investigations

into the case of the attempted assassination suffered

by him and his family so that this act does not go

unpunished.

The CONAIE has declared a state of

emergency among their people and is preparing

an extraordinary assembly. At the same time it is

calling upon the international community to stay vigilant as

to the political situation in Ecuador, the protection of social

leaders lives and the respect of the human rights of all Ecuadorians.

Patricio Zhingri T.

Dirigente de Comunicación, ECUARUNARI.

Translated by Robin Nieto