Ecuador

Ecuador has enlisted Mercury Public Affairs to bolster political-diplomatic ties with the US.

The focus is on migration, trade and security issues, including anti-terrorism matters, according to the contract with Mercury, effective March 1.

The 90-day pact is worth $165K to Mercury, which edged out BGR Group and Potomac International Partners for the work.

Ecuador’s president Daniel Nobia has launched a war on organized crime for the nation that has the highest homicide rate in Latin America.

On that front, he announced a “strategic alliance” with Erik Prince, the founder of the private military company that was known as Blackwater, which was involved in committing atrocities in Iraq following the US invasion of that country.

Nobia on March 13 posted on X that he established that alliance “to strengthen our capabilities in the fight against narco-terrorism and to protect our waters from illegal fishing.”

Prince, a former Navy seal, has close ties with the Trump administration. He is the brother of Betsy DeVos, who headed the Dept. of Education during Trump’s first term in office.

Trump in 2020 pardoned four security guards from Blackwater who were jailed for killing 14 civilians in Baghdad in 2007.

Mercury’s contract calls for arranging meetings for Ecuadorian officials with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz.