Machete-wielding cartel thugs have threatened to kill hostages and execute anyone they find in the streets of Ecuador at night, according to terrifying videos released as the South American nation descended into lawless chaos.

Ecuador’s president has ordered his army to ‘neutralise’ 20 drug gangs after gunmen stormed and opened fire in a TV studio and inmates executed prison guards.

At least 10 people are known to have been killed in a series of barbaric attacks by the drug gangs as the nation erupted into a deadly ‘civil war’.

The crazed criminals took scores of police officers hostage during their deadly rampage that saw explosions tear through Ecuador’s cities, with the mobsters declaring: ‘You declared war, you will get war’.

The gangs unleashed their fury after President Daniel Noboa on Monday declared a countrywide state of emergency and nightly curfew following the escape of Jose Adolfo Macias, aka ‘Fito’ – leader of Ecuador’s biggest gang Choneros – on Sunday. 

In the days since, the gangs stormed the state-owned TC Television in the port city of Guayaquil with harrowing video showing them holding terrified staff hostage for hours while pointing shotguns at their heads as they pleaded ‘please don’t shoot’. 

Further terrifying footage showed three kidnapped officers sitting at the ground with a gun pointed at them as one visibly terrified policeman read a statement that read: ‘You declared war, you will get war. You declared a state of emergency. We declare police, civilians and soldiers to be the spoils of war.’ 

The statement added anyone found on the street after 11pm ‘will be executed’. 

Another video showed a group of what appeared to be prison guards being held hostage by masked inmates wielding machetes and knives, with one of the uniformed men sitting at a table, also reading a statement. The prisoners held the blades to the throats of the guards, most of whom were sat on the floor.

In response to the horrific violence, President Noboa has ordered the army to ‘neutralise’ criminal gangs after the gangsters declared war, with the violence threatening to spill over into Peru.

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