CARACAS: Venezuela on Friday (Sep 19) accused america of waging an “undeclared battle” within the Caribbean and known as for a UN probe of American strikes which have killed over a dozen alleged drug traffickers on boats in latest weeks.
Washington has deployed warships to worldwide waters off Venezuela’s coast, backed by F-35 fighters despatched to Puerto Rico in what it calls an anti-drug operation.
“It’s an undeclared battle, and you may already see how folks, whether or not or not they’re drug traffickers, have been executed within the Caribbean Sea. Executed with out the appropriate to a protection,” Protection Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez stated as he attended a navy train in response to the US “menace”.
His remarks got here simply hours earlier than US President Donald Trump introduced one other navy strike on a ship, claiming three more alleged “narcoterrorists” were killed, bringing the whole variety of deaths in latest weeks to 17.
He didn’t say when the assault happened, and solely specified that it occurred within the US Southern Command space of accountability, which incorporates Central and South America, in addition to the Caribbean.
The strikes have prompted debate over the legality of the killings, with drug trafficking itself not a capital offense below US regulation.
Washington has additionally not supplied particular particulars to again up its claims that the boats focused have really been trafficking medicine.
Venezuelan Legal professional Basic Tarek William Saab claimed that “the usage of missiles and nuclear weapons to homicide defenseless fishermen on a small boat are crimes towards humanity that have to be investigated by the UN”.
The largest US naval deployment within the Caribbean in many years has stoked fears america is planning to assault Venezuelan territory.
On Wednesday, Venezuela launched three days of navy workouts on its Caribbean island of La Orchila in response to the perceived menace from a US flotilla of seven ships and a nuclear-powered submarine.
La Orchila is near the realm the place america intercepted and held a Venezuelan fishing vessel for eight hours over the weekend.
