A diplomatic spat between Argentina and Ecuador escalated Tuesday after it was revealed that a convicted former cabinet minister, who had been living in the Argentine embassy, had escaped Quito to Venezuela. Maria de los Angeles Duarte, who served under former president Rafael Correa, was sentenced to eight years for bribery, but had been holed up in Argentina’s embassy since August 2020 with her son, whose father is Argentine. Argentina had offered Duarte asylum, but Ecuador refused to grant her free passage out of the country. Duarte “was present in the Argentine embassy in Caracas” from 11:00 am on Tuesday, the Argentine foreign ministry said in a statement, without giving any details of how she had managed to escape to Venezuela. (https://news.yahoo.com/ecuador-argentina-diplomatic-row-over-032507763.html) Ecuador reacted angrily, summoning Argentina’s ambassador Gabriel Fuks to explain what it called inconsistencies in the embassy’s explanations of how Duarte had escaped and for refusing to hand over video surveillance footage from inside the compound. Quito then declared Fuks persona non grata and recalled its own ambassador to Argentina for consultations. Buenos Aires then followed suit, recalling its ambassador from Quito and saying it would also expel Ecuador’s ambassador.