Trump says US military kills 11 people in strike on drug-carrying boat from Venezuela | World News
The United States military carried out a deadly strike on a vessel from Venezuela allegedly carrying illegal narcotics and killed 11 “Narcoterrors” who were tied to the cartel Tren de Aragua, announced President Donald Trump on Tuesday.
Trump posted about the military operation on his Truth Social platform and said the boat was in international waters and it was transporting illegal drugs which were bound for the United States. Trump said the military targeted members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua (TDA).
During a press briefing at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said “We just, over the last few minutes, literally shot out a boat, a drug-carrying boat, a lot of drugs in that boat. And there’s more where that came from. We have a lot of drugs pouring into our country, coming in for a long time…These came out of Venezuela.”
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The Trump adminration has escalated military and political pressure on the dispensation of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in the past few weeks, including through a reward offering $50 million for information leading to his arrest on drug-trafficking charges. Maduro has vowed to battle out any US military intervention in the country.
In his post on Truth Social, Trump accused Maduro that drug cartel TDA works under the control of Venezuelan president and that it has been “responsible for mass murder, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and acts of violence and terror across the US.”
Trump also released a video of the strikes carried out the US military which showed an aerial video of a motor boat speeding across the choppy waters before it burst into flames.
The US president said the strikes led to the killing of “11 terrors” and that no US forces were harmed in the strike. The Pentagon is yet to release the specifics related to the strike, including what kind of drugs were on board the vessel, its quantity and how the strike was carried out.
