The Latin American Report # 627

Late on Saturday, US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced a new lethal attack by the US forces deployed in the Caribbean, this time against a vessel that was allegedly transporting drugs, and whose three crew members died. The Trump administration remains undeterred in conducting these attacks even as high-ranking Republican politicians are demanding a better explanation of its legal rationale, not to mention the Democrats, who have denounced being omitted from the limited and scattered accountability process that has taken place in Congress regarding this matter.

"This vessel-like EVERY OTHER-was known by our intelligence to be involved in illicit narcotics smuggling, was transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics," Hegseth said in a statement published on X and cited by AP. The death toll from these actions, both in the Caribbean and in the Eastern Pacific, is now set at 64, while three people have survived—two of them were rescued by the US forces themselves and transferred to their countries of origin, and a third was recovered by the Mexican Navy.

Washington defends the existence of an equivalence between Al-Qaeda and the "narco-terrorist" organizations based in Latin America, which, by its account, have caused more deaths in the United States than the former. "[W]e will treat them EXACTLY how we treated Al-Qaeda," Hegseth warned again in this sense. The Caribbean "branch" of the conflict targets Venezuela, while its version in the Eastern Pacific has, at times, refocused the effort on Colombia.

This Sunday, the Kremlin acknowledged that there have been contacts with Caracas regarding a potential request for help to the Eurasian giant. "We are in contact with our Venezuelan friends," said the Russian government spokesperson about reports in the press indicating that Nicolás Maduro's government asked Russia, China, and Iran for help to strengthen its military apparatus.

No one knows for sure if the US deployment—the largest since the Gulf War for some experts—is limited to a pressure strategy aimed at really curbing drug trafficking—depicting the Miraflores Palace as the brain of a terrible cartel—, or if it is merely a pretext to militarily intervene in Venezuela. Irresponsibly, in my opinion, some politicians like the Cuban-origin representatives Mario Díaz-Balart and María Elvira Salazar have suggested that this show of force will at some point lead to action against Maduro.

Regional news brief

• In Jamaica, the death toll from the passage of Hurricane Melissa, which entered the Caribbean nation as a category 5 on the Saffir-Simpson scale, rose to 28. In Haiti, meanwhile, although it did not suffer the direct onslaught of the meteorological event, the number of dead so far is 31, which in my opinion denotes the limited organizational capacities—or the irresponsibility—of the ad hoc government established there. In Cuba, no deaths are reported, but as in Jamaica and Haiti, the damage to crops and infrastructures of all kinds is substantial and will take a great deal of time and resources—which Havana chronically lacks—to resolve.
  

• In Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum lamented this Sunday the death of 23 people in a fire at a Waldo's brand store in Hermosillo, the capital of the northern state of Sonora. "My heartfelt condolences to the families and loved ones of the people who died in the fire that occurred in a store in downtown Hermosillo," said about the tragedy the first woman to lead the political business in the Zócalo Square. The fire appears to have been accidental, caused by an explosion when the establishment was packed with people.
  

• Also in Mexico, this past Saturday, a group of hitmen assassinated the mayor of the municipality of Uruapan in the western state of Michoacán. The official, who had adopted a strong public stance against organized crime, was shot while taking part in a local festivity in the municipality's main square. Just another, blatant show of force from the Mexican criminal structures.
  

This is all for today’s report.