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This story originally appeared in Common Dreams on Aug. 24, 2026.It is shared here under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) license.
The US military has resumed its campaign of bombing alleged drug-trafficking vessels after a two-month pause in a campaign that many legal experts and human rights groups believe constitutes a murder spree.
In a Monday social media post, US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said it carried out a “lethal kinetic strike on a low-profile vessel operating along established narco-trafficking routes” in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday. Two people were killed as a result of the attack, SOUTHCOM claimed.
In announcing the strike, SOUTHCOM Commander Gen. Francis Donovan said the attack was part of a campaign of “imposing total systemic friction on narco-terrorists—disrupting their operations, dismantling their leadership, and eliminating cartel terror across the region.”
Donovan’s boasts about the effectiveness of the boat strikes in combating the drug trade come less than a month after a leaked a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) analysis revealed that the boat-bombing campaign has not “reduced the amount of cocaine entering” the country, as drug cartels have found alternate methods for shipping their product into the US.
With the latest two casualties, the boat bombing campaign launched nearly a year ago by President Donald Trump’s administration has now claimed the lives of at least 223 people.
Adam Isaacson, director of the Defense Oversight program at the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), criticized the administration for resuming its boat bombings despite “overwhelming evidence that they are murder; that many, likely most, of the dead are either super-low-level or uninvolved with drugs; and that cocaine supply is unaffected.”
Brian Finucane, senior adviser to the US Program at the International Crisis Group, delivered a similarly scathing assessment, commenting that “the Trump administration’s lawless killing spree at sea resumes.”
Nicholas Grossman, professor of international relations at the University of Illinois, described the boat strike campaign as “murderous” and “illegal,” adding that its victims are “not terrorists” and “may not even be drug traffickers.”
Investigative journalist Camila Lourdes Galarza observed that “there’s still no proof any of the victims” of the boat strikes were involved in the drug trade.
Lourdes Galarza sarcastically added that if the victims had been drug traffickers, “the US would probably give them a deal” like the one given to Juan Orlando Hernández, the former president of Honduras who was pardoned by Trump last year despite being previously convicted on narcotics trafficking charges.
The Belgian federal government has nominated Hans Kluge (pictured) for the position of Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO).
“I am very honoured by the trust Belgium has placed in me and am grateful for the opportunity to take on this important responsibility,” Kluge said on X. “Serving the WHO has been the greatest privilege of my professional life.”
Kluge has served as WHO Regional Director for Europe since 2020 and began a second term in February 2025. Under WHO rules, he will step aside as WHO/Europe Director while campaigning for the role, a process that involves lobbying member states, NGOs and the organisation's largest funders.
Tried and tested After qualifying as a doctor in Belgium, he began his international career with Médecins Sans Frontières in conflict settings in Liberia and Somalia. He subsequently coordinated tuberculosis programmes in Siberian prisons and across the former Soviet Union.
Kluge joined WHO in 1999, initially working on tuberculosis and HIV in...