Ecuador expelled every Cuban diplomat in the country on March 4 and gave them 48 hours to get out. President Daniel Noboa’s government offered no reason.
The expulsion capped three days of escalating action. On March 2, U.S. Southern Command chief Gen. Francis Donovan visited Noboa in Quito. The next day, Noboa signed Executive Decree 317 terminating Ecuador’s own ambassador to Cuba, José María Borja López, who also held accreditations to Dominica, Jamaica, and San Vicente and Las Granadinas out of Havana. That same day, SOUTHCOM announced joint U.S.-Ecuador military operations against “Designated Terrorist Organizations” in Ecuador — the first American land-based military action in Latin America under the Trump administration’s anti-cartel campaign.
On March 4, Ecuador’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared Ambassador Basilio Antonio Gutiérrez García and all diplomatic, consular, and administrative staff persona non grata under Article 9 of the Vienna Convention, which permits such declarations without explanation. Ecuadorian military deployed around the Cuban embassy in Quito within the hour.
Then the Associated Press witnessed a man on the embassy rooftop burning documents in an oven. Noboa posted the video on X with a three-word caption: “A paper barbecue.” Pro-government assembly member Lucía Jaramillo claimed the burning confirmed prior allegations of Cuban political espionage in Ecuador. No evidence accompanied the claim.
Cuba’s Foreign Ministry called the expulsion an “unfriendly and unprecedented act” carried out “without providing any arguments.” Havana drew a straight line to Washington, saying the timing did “not seem coincidental” given intensifying U.S. pressure on Cuba and Trump’s hemispheric summit scheduled for March 7 in Miami.
Five days before the expulsion, President Trump told reporters the U.S. could pursue a “friendly takeover of Cuba,” describing a country with “no money, no oil, no food” under his January fuel blockade. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was already negotiating with Havana.
Ecuador has not explained the expulsion. The Donovan visit on Sunday, the joint military operations on Monday, the ambassador recall on Monday, the PNG declaration on Tuesday, and Trump’s Latin American summit on Saturday all landed within a single week.
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