(Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com) The US bombing campaign against alleged drug-running boats in the waters of Latin America has killed more than 100 people, according to the numbers released by the Trump administration and the US military.
The latest strikes were announced by the US Southern Command on December 18 and targeted boats in the Eastern Pacific Ocean. According to SOUTHCOM, the strikes killed five “narco-terrorists,” a term the administration uses to justify executing people at sea without a trial for a suspected crime that doesn’t receive the death penalty in the US.
The bombings bring the total number of people extra-judicially executed since the campaign started in early September to 104. A total of 28 strikes have been launched, and 29 boats have been blown up, including 11 in the Caribbean and 18 in the Eastern Pacific.
The bombing campaign began off the coast of Venezuela and started as part of the Trump administration’s pressure campaign aimed at ousting Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, and recently escalated into a blockade on tankers entering and leaving Venezuelan ports.
The Pentagon has never shown any evidence to back up its claims about what the boats it has bombed are carrying and has acknowledged to Congress that it doesn’t know all of the identities of the people it has been killing.
This article originally appeared at Antiwar.com.
