A judge has ordered the 16 soldiers to remain in custody while the investigation into the death continues.
Ecuador's attorney general has confirmed that the charred bodies found last week in the city of Taura are the bodies of four children who went missing on December 8.
The attorney general's office announced the findings on Tuesday after the boys' disappearance sparked national outrage, and questions about the involvement of Ecuador's military.
“The results of genetic tests confirm that the four bodies found in Taura are the same as the three youths and a child who went missing after doing military duty on December 8,” the office said. social media post.
The families of the four missing boys – aged 11 to 15 – said they had gone out of the city of Guayaquil on the beach to play football when they went missing.
Pictures showing two of the boys being taken away by soldiers in a truck.
But the Associated Press reported that the investigation into the boys' disappearance appears to have been suspended. Although the authorities launched an investigation a day after the alleged abduction, an investigation into the involvement of the military was not announced for another 15 days.
The investigation into military involvement only began as family members pressed for more information on social media and in the press.
The disappearance of the boys comes amid a series of terrorist attacks in Ecuador that have involved several emergency notifications.
The laws would give more power to the government's security forces, but critics have warned that an increase in military might open the door to civil liberties. brutality.
Last week, 16 Ecuadorian soldiers were arrested for missing the boys.
Before their bodies were identified on Tuesday, Judge Dennis Ugalde Alvarez ordered the 16 soldiers to be detained pending an investigation into their involvement.
Antonio Arroyo, the uncle of the two missing boys, told Reuters after Tuesday's verdict that he hoped the soldiers involved in the case would be arrested.
“Let them go to prison where they are.” “We want them to be locked up (in prison), not in the military,” Arroyo said.
Demonstrations related to the loss, known as “Caso Malvinas” or “Malvinas Case”, have erupted in the capital Quito and in Guayaquil.
“We don't accept it. We are angry and angry because the government and the authorities have not said anything,” pensioner Fernando Bustamante, 70, told Reuters as he stood with protesters outside a court in Guayaquil as the judge handed down the sentence.
In his attempt to deal with a increase in violent crime in Ecuador, the President Daniel Noboa has designated about 22 terrorist groups as “terrorist” organizations and has declared a state of emergency in several countries to allow the military to assist the police.
In April, voters too widely accepted several measures aimed at giving the authorities greater powers to fight crime.
However, such states of emergency have a long and complicated history in Latin America, where security forces sometimes claim special powers in the name of fighting crime.
government abuses such as corruption, torture and forced to disappear it has often been associated with such sudden announcements.