One survivor reported, two killed in US boat strike in the Eastern Pacific 

The administration of President Donald Trump has announced United States’ latest boat strike in international waters, which killed two people in the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

Friday’s attack brings the total number of bombings to at least 36 since Trump began his campaign on September 2. An estimated 125 people have been killed, including the two latest casualties.

US Southern Command, the military unit that overseas operations in Central America, South America and the Caribbean Sea, reported that one survivor had yet to be recovered. It added that the US Coast Guard had been notified to activate its search-and-rescue operations.

“On Jan. 23, at the direction of [Secretary of Defence] Pete Hegseth, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations,” the command wrote in a social media post.

“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations.”

The deadly strike is the first such attack to take place in 2026: The last one took place on December 31.

And it is also the first to unfold since the US launched a full-scale military operation on January 3 in Venezuela to remove the country’s then-president, Nicolas Maduro, and his wife Cilia Flores. The couple is now being held in a federal jail in Brooklyn, New York, on charges of narcotics trafficking.