Las Cuevas, Trinidad — LAS CUEVAS, Trinidad (AP) — Venezuela’s ambassador to the United Nations, Samuel Moncada, on Thursday condemned The last American strike On a small boat in the waters of the Caribbean Sea, killing six people, describing it as “a new set of extrajudicial executions.”
He called on the UN Security Council to investigate what he called a “series of assassinations,” noting that there had been five deadly attacks and 27 deaths. Since strikes began in the Caribbean in Septembertargeting what US officials say are suspected drug traffickers.
Among those believed killed in the latest raid on Tuesday were two fishermen from Trinidad and Tobago, whom Moncada referred to in his speech.
As Moncada spoke at the United Nations on Thursday, people in the quiet fishing town of Las Cuevas in northern Trinidad mourned the disappearance of Chad Joseph. His relatives believe he was killed in the raid, although they have provided no other evidence that he was on the boat that was hit.
“People are crying. Why is Donald Trump destroying families?” Afisha Clement, Joseph’s cousin, told the Associated Press.
She said Joseph moved to Venezuela six months ago and was working on farms in hopes of making more money.
But in recent weeks, Clement said he told the family he was disappointed with the money he was making and intended to return home.
Clement said he boarded a boat on Tuesday bound for Trinidad and was expected to arrive on Wednesday.
But no one has heard from him since.
His family called and sent him text messages to no avail, as they condemned the strikes.
“He was a quiet person,” Christine Clement, Joseph’s grandmother, said from her living room. “He left the entire village in grief.”
Also missing is a man identified only as “Samaro,” local newspaper Trinidad and Tobago Guardian reported.
At the United Nations headquarters, Moncada held up the front page of the newspaper, which detailed the lives of the two men from Trinidad.
“There is a killer roaming the Caribbean,” Moncada said. “People from different countries… are suffering from the effects of these massacres.”
Only a few miles separate Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago at their closest point, and ongoing military strikes It has frightened fishermen in the two-island country.
“There is absolutely no justification,” Moncada said. “They are starting a war”
The administration of US President Donald Trump said it was looking into the matter Alleged drug traffickers as illegal combatants Which must be confronted with military force.
Democrats said the strikes violated US and international law, while some Republicans sought more information about the strikes and their legal justifications.
Meanwhile, the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, did so He praised the first strike on a boat He is suspected of carrying drugs in the southern Caribbean and said all traffickers should be “violently” killed.
The United States began building up its naval forces in the Caribbean earlier this year in an unprecedented manner not seen in recent times.
“The United States is overseeing a seismic realignment of defense priorities and assets in the Western Hemisphere,” a recent report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., stated.
She indicated that the US territory of Puerto Rico It provided “the lion’s share of this infrastructure” While the US military searches for airfields and ports in the Caribbean as concerns grow about strikes.
“The administration’s declaration of war on drug cartels raised a host of legal, ethical, and moral questions, and while declaring a state of armed conflict provided some legal basis, this is already facing fierce internal scrutiny,” the center stated in its report.
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Cotto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico.