Ecuador Embraces Global Critics, Hounds Its Own

Ecuador is back in the spotlight as it mulls giving NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden asylum in the name of democracy and human rights. President Rafael Correa, who granted WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange asylum last year, is being hailed as a champion of free speech and is cementing his role as one of Latin America’s leading leftists. But at home, his record is more complicated. As he’s fought for WikiLeaks’ right to publish secret and confidential information, he’s imposed some of the hemisphere’s most draconian regulations on his own press. This week, a new media watchdog with sweeping powers began operating. It’s headed by a Correa appointee. The president has also passed decrees hobbling civil-society groups and, as Castro discovered, dusted-off dictatorship-era laws from the 1960s that give authorities a wide dragnet to sweep up “terrorists.”