The US army carried out a strike towards an alleged drug-trafficking vessel in the eastern Pacific Ocean on Monday, killing two individuals, in keeping with US Southern Command.
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“On Dec. 29, at the direction of @SecWar Pete Hegseth, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations in international waters,” SOUTHCOM wrote on X.
SOUTHCOM stated two males had been killed and no US service members had been harmed in the strike.
At least 107 people have now been killed in strikes on suspected drug boats as a part of a marketing campaign, dubbed Operation Southern Spear, that the Trump administration has stated is geared toward curbing narcotics trafficking.
The administration has labeled these killed as “unlawful combatants” and claimed the flexibility to interact in deadly strikes with out judicial evaluation because of a classified Justice Department finding.
The US army most recently struck a “low-profile vessel” allegedly trafficking medication in the eastern Pacific Ocean on December 22. The Trump administration’s strikes have prompted scrutiny from some members of Congress, in addition to human rights teams.
Monday’s strike comes days after President Donald Trump stated the United States took out a “big facility” final week as a part of a strain marketing campaign towards Venezuela that has included a large US naval and troop buildup in the Caribbean and a blockade of sanctioned oil tankers, in addition to the strikes.
Trump, who has offered few extra particulars on the “big facility” motion, advised reporters on Monday that “there was a major explosion in the dock area where they load the boats up with drugs” and that an “implementation area” was “no longer around.”
There have been no experiences from Venezuela of a serious facility just like the one the president described being destroyed.
Last week, Trump declined to reply a query about his endgame in Venezuela, whilst he once more raised the specter of land strikes and stated it’d be “smart” for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to step down.
Maduro has repeatedly criticized the US army deployment in the Caribbean and accused the United States of waging a marketing campaign of “psychological terrorism” towards his nation.
In a response to Trump ordering a “complete” blockade of sanctioned oil tankers coming into and leaving Venezuela earlier this month, Venezuela’s National Assembly permitted a legislation final week that permits for jail phrases of as much as 20 years for anybody discovered supporting “piracy” or “blockades.”
This story has been up to date with extra reporting.