Ecuador's presidential candidate shot dead after campaign rally

Ecuadorian presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio has been shot dead after holding a rally in Quito, top officials said.

President Guillermo Lasso has confirmed Villavicencio's death in a statement on Twitter on Wednesday, renamed X, vowing that "this crime will not go unpunished."

Local media, citing Interior Minister Juan Zapata, said Villavicencio was shot dead after the rally.

The 59-year-old centrist was one of eight candidates in the first round of the presidential election scheduled for August 20.

Lasso said he had summoned his top security officials for an urgent meeting on "this event that has shocked the country."

"Organised crime has gone too far, but the full weight of the law will be applied to them," Lasso said in his post.

Villavicencio's history

According to opinion polls, Villavicencio's support was at 7.5 percent, ranking him fifth out of eight presidential candidates for the August 20 vote.

Villavicencio, from the Andean province of Chimborazo, was a former union member at state oil company Petroecuador and later a journalist who denounced alleged millions in oil contract losses.

He had on Tuesday made a report to the attorney general's office about an oil business, but further details of his report were kept private.

Villavicencio was an outspoken critic of former president Rafael Correa and was sentenced to 18 months in prison for defamation over statements made against the former president.

He fled to Indigenous territory within Ecuador and later was given asylum in Peru.

As a legislator, Villavicencio was criticised by opposition politicians for obstructing an impeachment process this year against Lasso, which lead the latter to call the early elections.

"Today, more than ever, the need to act with a strong hand against crime is reiterated. May God have him in his glory," fellow presidential hopeful Jan Topic said in a post on X.