NEW YORK, January 1. /TASS/. The US military has launched new attacks on the vessels targeting two boats allegedly used by members of drug cartels killing five people, the US Southern Command said.
According to a message on X, the joint task force of Operation Southern Spear struck on December 31 on the orders of the Minister of War Pete Hegseth.
Intelligence confirmed the vessels were transiting along known narco-trafficking routes and were involved in drug smuggling, the US Southern Command said.
As a result of the strikes, the command said, three people were killed on board the first boat, and two in the second.
Washington unfairly accuses Caracas of not actively fighting drug smuggling. As The New York Times reported in August, US President Donald Trump signed a non-public directive on the beginning of the use of military force against Latin American drug cartels. After that, significant additional American forces were deployed to the Caribbean, including a strike group of ships led by the aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford. In recent months, the US military has destroyed about 30 boats off the coast of Latin America under the pretext of combating drug smuggling, and more than 100 people have been killed. After one of these strikes, Colombian President Gustavo Petro said that the American operation had killed a fisherman from his country, not a drug dealer.