Ecuador officially quits regional defense treaty

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa has signed a decree to officially withdraw his country from a regional defense treaty that was signed with the United States at the height of the Cold War, the Ecuadorian Foreign Ministry announced Wednesday. The move came after Ecuador's National Assembly approved the country's withdrawal from the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (TIAR), or the Rio Pact, with 90 votes in favor. Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino hailed the congressional decision on Twitter, saying "the Ecuadorian people took a decisive step towards emancipation." The ministry said Correa signed the decree Tuesday, joining other Latin American countries that have pulled out of the TIAR, including Nicaragua, Bolivia, Venezuela, Mexico and Peru. The foreign ministry will be in charge of implementing the decree. "Ecuador renounces all articles of the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance," it said. The Inter-American mutual defense pact, which basically states that an attack on any of the region's countries is tantamount to an attack on all, was signed on Sept. 2, 1947 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and ratified by Ecuador in 1949.