US military says strike on alleged drug-smuggling boat kills two

What the report says

The US military said it carried out a strike on a suspected drug-trafficking boat in the Pacific Ocean, killing two people. In a post on X on Monday, US Southern Command said the operation took place on Sunday and targeted a vessel moving along established narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific.

According to SOUTHCOM, intelligence showed the boat was involved in drug trafficking, and the strike was carried out by the Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere under the direction of SOUTHCOM Commander Gen. Francis L. Donovan. The command said the vessel was a low-profile boat, and it shared grainy video that appeared to show the craft before an explosion.

Al Jazeera reported that the Trump administration has not presented definitive evidence linking the targeted vessels to drug trafficking. Legal experts and rights groups have said such attacks could amount to extrajudicial killings. The Pentagon’s inspector general said in May that it would review whether the military followed standard targeting procedures, though not the legal basis for the strikes.

The report places the incident within a broader US campaign against suspected drug-smuggling vessels in the Eastern Pacific and Caribbean, an effort that the article says has left more than 200 people dead since it began. That background, along with President Donald Trump’s claims that Washington is effectively at war with Latin American cartels, helps explain why the strike has drawn legal and human rights scrutiny.