(Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com) On August 28, US forces boarded a boat off the coast of Ecuador, removed the crew, and then blew up the vessel to sink it, according to a press release from US Southern Command and testimony from the Ecuadorian crew members, as the US continues expanding its military campaign across Latin America.
SOUTHCOM said that US Marines and sailors from the USS San Antonio, an amphibious transport ship operating in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, interdicted a vessel the US military command claimed was operating as a “floating refueling station in support of illicit at-sea drug trafficking operations in international waters.” The command said once the crew was removed, US forces “sank the vessel,” and it released a video of the boat being blown up.
SOUTHCOM claimed that US intelligence showed the vessel was “operating in support of the Los Choneros violent narco-terrorist organization,” but it didn’t provide evidence to back up the claim. For their part, 14 Ecuadorian fishermen who were on board the boat, the “Tres Hermanos”, were returning from a fishing trip.
“We were boarded by the American patrol. From 8:00 am to 1:00 pm, they held us, and it was extremely cruel treatment, pointing guns at us, throwing us to the ground, and searching us,” Hector Espinales, one of the crew members, told the Ecuadorian news outlet Primicias. Espinales also said that he was never told why they were detained and why the boat was blown up.
The Tres Hermanos served as the mother ship for four smaller fishing trawlers, and the fisherman said they returned to the Ecuadorian port of Manta on the smaller boats, where they went to lodge a complaint with the Manta Port Authority. The Primicias report said they were told to return on Monday, August 31, to give their statements, suggesting Ecuadorian authorities did not have enough evidence to detain them.
SOUTHCOM said the raid was conducted in coordination with Ecuador, and the Ecuadorian Defense Ministry expressed support for the US operation, saying that the “destruction of a vessel operating as a fuel refueling station for drug trafficking activities has occurred.”
The US and Ecuador have ramped up military cooperation against alleged drug trafficking activity, which included the bombing of what the Ecuadorian government claimed was a drug camp inside Ecuador back in March, though a report from The New York Times found the facility was a dairy farm. A series of mysterious drone attacks have also targeted Ecuadorian fishing boats, incidents first reported by Drop Site News. A report from The Washington Post recently revealed that the attacks were part of a covert CIA operation, the details of which remain shrouded in secrecy.
The US operations in and off the coast of Ecuador are part of the broader US military campaign, which has included the strikes on smaller alleged drug-running boats. The attacks, which amount to extrajudicial executions at sea, have killed at least 227 people.
This article originally appeared at Antiwar.com.
