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US military strikes another alleged drug boat in Caribbean, killing 3

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military said Friday that it has carried out another deadly strike on a vessel accused of trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.

U.S. Southern Command said on social media that the boat “was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Caribbean and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations.” It said the strike killed three people. A video linked to the post shows a boat moving through the water before exploding in flames.

Friday’s attack raises the death toll from the Trump administration’s strikes on alleged drug boats to 133 people in at least 38 attacks carried out since early September in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declared last week that “some top cartel drug-traffickers” in the region “have decided to cease all narcotics operations INDEFINITELY due to recent (highly effective) kinetic strikes in the Caribbean.” However, Hegseth did not provide any details or information to back up this claim, made in a post on his personal account on social media.

President Donald Trump has said the U.S. is in “armed conflict” with cartels in Latin America and has justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs. But his administration has offered little evidence to support its claims of killing “narcoterrorists.”

With Trump in a holding pattern on Iran war, allies and critics worry he risks getting boxed in

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is facing warnings from foes and allies alike that he’s getting boxed in on the Iran war, a conflict he sold as a brief military incursion but that has since settled into a holding pattern. It's been nearly a week since U.S. and Iranian negotiators reached a tentative agreement to extend the ceasefire in the conflict by 60 days and start a new round of talks on Iran’s nuclear program that required Trump's sign off. But Trump has called for unspecified changes to the agreement and Iranian officials — perhaps calculating that the Republican president is reluctant to restart the bombardment after burning through key weapons systems — are showing no signs they'll give in to new demands. A series of strikes by the U.S. and Iran this week has raised fresh concern that the ceasefire could collapse. Trump on Wednesday downplayed the significance.
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