Suspended Ecuador Vice President Hasn't Ceased Govt Functions: Lawyer

Ecuador's suspended Vice President Jorge Glas will not cease his functions as the country's vice president, his lawyer Eduardo Franco said on Thursday. 

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Ecuador: Lenin Moreno Says Glas Is No Longer Vice-President

Glas has decided to go to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, IACHR, to seek favor, Franco added. 

Glas made the decision after Ecuadorean president Lenin Moreno said Wednesday that elected Vice President Jorge Glas is no longer in the position to maintain his post per the Constitution. 

"According to what's stated by the Constitution, Vice-President Jorge Glas was ceased from office,” Moreno made the announcement at the beginning of a cabinet meeting. 

The suspended vice president's "temporary absence" has exceeded 90 days, which the government officials have declared as definitive. 

In the case of definitive absence, Article 150 of Ecuador’s Constitution enables the president to send a list of three potential candidates to the National Assembly from which they'd select one candidate to replace Glas. 

Per the Constitution's Article 145, an abandonment needs to be declared by a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly and then verified by the Constitutional Court, Franco said, adding that the abandonment needs to be voluntary, but was an "illegal and unconstitutional preventive detention and an unfair sentence." 

"He (Moreno) has no legal or constitutional powers to establish a cessation of the vice president of the Republic by default because there is a deadline for the temporary absence or because there is supposedly a definitive fault," the lawyer said.  

Referring to Glas' impeachment, Franco said he has requested the legal arguments be heard by the Supervisory Commission and then by the plenary of the National Assembly.