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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Tom Phillips in Guayaquil

‘This used to be a calm place’: killing continues in Ecuador’s week of chaos

A police officer stands guard at the El Blanqueado community police unit in southern Quito, on 11 January, a day after an explosion damaged the station.
A police officer stands guard at the El Blanqueado community police unit in southern Quito, on 11 January, a day after an explosion damaged the station. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Political upheaval and street protests, gun battles and floods. José Luis Calderón has seen it all during his 23 years as one of Guayaquil’s top television journalists. Never had the Ecuadorean reporter been the story himself.

That changed just after lunch last Tuesday when the 47-year-old reporter heard shouts and the sound of people running in the corridors of TC Televisión, the channel where he works. “At first … we thought it was a fight,” he remembered. But as the yelling intensified, it became clear it was not.

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