Washington: The US carried out a lethal strike on Oct. 17 against a vessel it says was affiliated with Colombia's Ejercito de Liberacion Nacional (ELN) guerilla group and engaged in narcotics smuggling, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Sunday, adding all three men on board were killed and no US forces were harmed.

According to Anadolu Agency, Hegseth stated that the strike was ordered by President Donald Trump and took place in international waters within the US Southern Command area of responsibility. He emphasized that US intelligence had determined the vessel was traveling along a known narcotrafficking route and was carrying a significant amount of narcotics.

In a post on X, a US social media platform, Hegseth described those killed as 'male narco-terrorists' and framed the US campaign against drug-smuggling groups as part of a broader effort to treat such organizations as terrorist threats. He expressed that these cartels are akin to Al Qaeda in the Western Hemisphere, using violence and terrorism to threaten US national security and harm its citizens.

The strike is reported as the latest in a series of recent counternarcotics operations in the region, which have involved strikes on suspected drug-smuggling vessels. Limited operational details have been released by the Department of Defense, though Hegseth did share video imagery alongside his announcement.

The US State Department and other agencies have long labeled the ELN as a terrorist organization. US counterdrug and counterterrorism efforts in the Caribbean and adjacent waters fall under the US Southern Command's mandate, which includes Latin America south of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Recent weeks have seen an uptick in operations targeting vessels suspected of carrying large quantities of illicit drugs.