Senior Trump administration officials briefed members of the Senate and House of Representatives on strikes on suspected drug ships off the coast of Venezuela, following congressional outcry over a lack of transparency about the operation, Reuters reported.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met with Republican and Democratic congressional leaders and senior members of national security committees for about an hour, discussing the U.S. strikes on ships in the Caribbean and Pacific that have killed dozens of people since early September.
President Donald Trump's administration insists that the targets were carrying drugs, without providing evidence or publicly explaining the legal rationale for the decision to attack the ships rather than stop them and arrest the people on board.
Several senators and members of the House of Representatives who attended the briefing said that administration officials had said the ships were carrying cocaine, not fentanyl, and had explained the legal rationale for the military's actions.
Some legal experts say the strikes may violate international law, as well as U.S. laws against assassination and prohibitions on killing.
Trump's fellow Republicans said they were pleased with the briefing, Reuters reported.
House Speaker Mike Johnson described the information about the ships as "exceptional", although he said the United States knew who was aboard the ships "almost to the last person".
Asked to clarify, Johnson said: "From what I know from the information I have so far, we can be sure. It's about the cartels. These are the people who are involved in this. They are doing this intentionally. These are not people who happen to be on the ship. They intend to smuggle contraband into the country, and this is causing great harm to the American people.“
The operations that Washington is conducting in the Caribbean under the pretext of combating drug trafficking threaten peace, security and stability in Latin America, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parilla said, TASS reported.
"We condemn the ongoing extrajudicial executions carried out by the US military in international waters both in the Caribbean and the Pacific", the minister wrote on his page on the "Ex" social network. "They constitute a serious violation of international law and human rights and pose a constant threat to peace, security and stability in Latin America and the Caribbean".
"By using force illegally and in a discriminatory manner, the US government ignores the root causes of drug trafficking in the United States – "in the main world market, where the money of drug traffickers is laundered with impunity, with the participation of a number of their politicians," Rodriguez Parilla noted.
Washington accuses the Venezuelan authorities of insufficiently combating drug smuggling. The US Navy has already destroyed at least four speedboats with the people on them in international waters of the Caribbean Sea, which Washington says were involved in drug trafficking from Venezuela.