US Southern Command announced on Monday night that its forces bombed three more alleged drug-running boats in the Eastern Pacific Ocean as the Trump administration continues the extra-judicial executions at sea amid increasing scrutiny of the bombing campaign.
SOUTHCOM claimed, without providing any evidence, that the boats were engaged in “narco-trafficking.” It said that the three strikes killed a total of eight “narco-terrorists,” a term the Trump administration uses to justify the executions for an alleged crime that doesn’t receive the death penalty in the US.
According to numbers released by the Trump administration, the attack brings the total number of people killed in the bombing campaign to 95. So far, 25 strikes have been launched, and 26 boats have been destroyed, including 11 in the Caribbean near Venezuela, where the strikes started, and 15 in the Eastern Pacific.
The US War Department has never provided any evidence to back up its claims about what the boats were allegedly carrying and has acknowledged that it doesn’t know the identities of all of the people it has been killing. While much of the scrutiny is focused on the September 2 attack that involved multiple strikes to kill survivors, the entire bombing campaign is clearly illegal under US and international law.
“While the September 2 strike seems uniquely depraved, every single strike taken against these boats by DoD is a summary execution of criminal suspects, people who even if tried in court would never get the death penalty,” Sarah Harrison, who previously served as associate general counsel at the Pentagon’s Office of General Counsel, International Affairs, told The Intercept earlier this month.
“Every single strike exposes those in the chain of command to the risk of criminal liability under murder statutes and international law prohibiting extrajudicial killings,” Harrison added.
The US has also continued its military buildup near Venezuela and march toward a regime change war to oust President Nicolas Maduro. A bill has been introduced in the House to block President Trump from launching an attack on the country without congressional authorization, as required by the Constitution, and is expected to be brought to the floor for a vote on Thursday.
