By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON, Aug 24 (Reuters) – The U.S. military said on Monday two people had been killed in a strike it launched on a vessel in the Eastern Pacific over the weekend, the latest in a series of similar attacks that Washington says target “narco-terrorists” but human rights groups say amount to extrajudicial killings.
FURTHER DETAILS:
• The U.S. Southern Command said the strike was carried out on Sunday.
• “Confirmed intelligence revealed the vessel’s active involvement in narco-trafficking. The operation killed two narco-terrorists,” it said on X.
• It did not identify the individuals targeted or specify their affiliation to any group beyond saying the vessel was “operating along established narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific.”
• President Donald Trump’s administration has been striking vessels that it accuses of transporting narcotics since September 2025. Sunday’s strike marked the first in more than two months.
• The U.S. military’s strikes on such vessels have killed more than 200 people.
• Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and independent U.N. experts have called the strikes unlawful extrajudicial killings.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington and Ananya Palyekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Rosalba O’Brien)
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