WASHINGTON, May 5 (Reuters) – The U.S. military said on Tuesday it struck a vessel in the Eastern Pacific, killing three people, in the latest such attack that rights groups label as “extrajudicial killings” and Washington describes as targeting “narco-terrorists.”
• The U.S. Southern Command alleged that the vessel struck on Tuesday 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 say the strikes amount to “unlawful extrajudicial killings.”
• The American Civil Liberties Union casts the assertions by the Trump administration against those it targets as “unsubstantiated, fear-mongering claims.”
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Neil Fullick)
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