Ecuadorian soldiers jailed over disappearance of four murdered boys - whose deaths sparked protests

Eleven soldiers have been jailed for more than 34 years over the disappearance of four murdered boys in Ecuador.

The children, aged between 11 and 15, went missing in December last year in the city of Guayaquil. Their disappearance happened during a military offensive against organised crime launched by the country's president, who has ‌decreed various states of emergency and ordered soldiers to patrol the streets.

Their families say the boys had left home to play football on the day they disappeared in the Las Malvinas neighbourhood of Ecuador's largest city. Protesters in Guayaquil held signs saying "we are still waiting for justice" and "never forgive, never forget" on Monday as the sentences were handed down.

Five other soldiers who assisted prosecutors were sentenced to two-and-a-half ​years behind bars, while a lieutenant colonel accused of being complicit, but who was not part of the patrol, ‍was declared innocent. Soldiers allegedly detained the boys during a night patrol, after which they beat them and forced them to remove their clothes.

They were allegedly abandoned naked in Taura, a desolate and dangerous rural area around 19 miles south of the city. One of the children called his father from Taura, but when he arrived to pick them up, he ‍could not find them, according to witness testimonies.

Days later, four charred bodies were identified as the missing children. Lawyers for the boy's families said autopsies found injuries and bruises ​that were sustained prior to their deaths.

"The patrol abandoned the minors in that area, knowing it was dangerous, desolate, and abandoned," Judge Jovanny Suarez said in the ruling ‌that ended a weeks-long criminal trial. Read more from Sky News:In Caracas as US threatens military actionRussian general killed by car bomb Lawyers for the soldiers had argued ⁠the prosecution's evidence was not conclusive.

They claimed the soldiers were ‌sent on patrol without prior training and that they had left the ‍minors alive in Taura. Ecuador's authorities continue to struggle with powerful drug cartels that hold huge amounts of influence.

President Daniel Noboa has ‌decreed various states of emergency and ordered soldiers to patrol the streets..