Ecuador president dissolves legislature to avoid impeachment

Ecuador President Guillermo Lasso announced Wednesday he was dissolving the opposition-led National Assembly and would rule by decree until snap general elections in six months. Lasso, one of Latin America's last conservative heads of state, applied a constitutional mechanism known as "muerte cruzada," or mutual death, as a last resort to stop impeachment proceedings over allegations of embezzlement, which he denies. The clause, which had never been used, allows him to close the legislature while setting him up to lose power in six months, although he can run for re-election. Soldiers and police prevented lawmakers from entering parliament, and opposition groups planned mass protests, calling the move "dictatorship."