U.S. Strikes Two More Suspected Smuggling Boats, Killing Five
U.S. Southern Command has killed another five suspected smugglers in waters off South or Central America, the agency announced on New Year's Eve.
On Wednesday, aerial assets in the Southern Command area of operations carried out lethal strikes on two suspected smuggling vessels, at the direction of the Pentagon. The vessels were operating on known drug trafficking routes and the military believed that they were engaged in moving drugs.
Three personnel were killed in the first vessel strike and two more in the second vessel, Southern Command said in a statement. The region of the event (either Caribbean or Eastern Pacific) was not specified.
The command has hit 14 vessels over the past month, killing dozens of suspects. In total, it has attacked 35 boats since September 2, killing 115 people, rescuing two, and launching a search for four more survivors.
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The Trump administration describes the targets of the strikes as "narco-terrorists" or "cartel terrorists," but reporting on the ground in South America suggests that most hired-on drug boat operators are fishermen, laborers, petty criminals and other low-income individuals. The Pentagon has not disclosed the identities of those eliminated in the strikes, if any are known. The majority of the deceased remain unidentified, according to MSNBC.
The strikes have attracted criticism in legal circles over questions of compliance with the international law of war. The Trump administration maintains that the attacks are legally justified.
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