The US military has conducted a second strike in as many days on a vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing three men, according to officials. The US Southern Command stated on Saturday that intelligence confirmed the vessel was travelling along narco-trafficking routes and engaged in related operations.
In a post on X, the command said: 'Three male narco-terrorists were killed during this action. No US military forces were harmed.' The strike follows a similar attack on Friday that also killed three men, bringing the total death toll from such US strikes over recent months to more than 200.
Friday's and Saturday's strikes were among four conducted in the past week. The Trump administration has declared an armed conflict with Latin American drug cartels, accusing them of flooding US communities with drugs. However, the White House has not provided definitive evidence that the targeted vessels were involved in drug trafficking, raising questions about the legality of the operations.
Human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have challenged the strikes, labelling them as 'unlawful extrajudicial killings'. Experts have also questioned the legal basis for the actions, given the lack of clear evidence linking the boats to drug smuggling.
