WASHINGTON, April 24 – The U.S. military said on Friday it struck a vessel in the Eastern Pacific, killing two people, in the latest such attack condemned by rights groups as “extrajudicial killings” and which the Trump administration says are aimed at “narco-terrorists.”
• The U.S. Southern Command alleged that the vessel struck on Friday was operated by “Designated Terrorist Organizations” that it did not identify.
• It said that no U.S. military forces were harmed. It described those killed as “male narco-terrorists,” without offering details.
• “Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations,” the U.S. Southern Command said on X.
• The U.S. military has made numerous such deadly strikes in the Eastern Pacific in recent weeks.
• President Donald Trump’s administration has been striking vessels that it accuses of transporting narcotics.
• The U.S. military’s strikes on such vessels have killed more than 170 people since September.
• Experts and human rights advocates, both in the U.S. and globally, have questioned the legality of the strikes.
• Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have said the strikes amount to “unlawful extrajudicial killings.”
• The American Civil Liberties Union has cast the assertions by the Trump administration against those it targets as “unsubstantiated, fear-mongering claims.” REUTERS