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The U.S. and Ecuador carried out a joint operation targeting drug trafficking in the South American country, authorities in both countries said on Friday. The U.S. described the move as “lethal kinetic operations.”
Neither U.S. Southern Command — the military command that oversees forces in Latin America — nor Ecuador’s defence ministry said whether anyone was killed or captured in the strike, which Ecuador dubbed operation “Total Extermination.”
The operation used helicopters, aircraft, river boats and drones to locate and bomb a drug traffickers’ training camp in northeastern Ecuador near the Colombian border, Ecuador’s defence ministry said in a statement.
The camp belonged to the Comandos de la Frontera (CDF), a Colombian criminal organization made up of FARC dissidents, and had a capacity for 50 people, the ministry said.
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa has made a military crackdown on organized crime a cornerstone of his administration. His government also imposed tariffs on its larger neighbour Colombia, accusing it of not doing enough to fight drug trafficking.
Noboa is set to travel to Miami this weekend to take part in the Trump administration’s “Shield of the Americas” summit, which brings together many right-wing leaders from across the region to discuss security and organized crime.
“The United States is a key ally in this fight,” Ecuador’s defence ministry said.
“At the request of Ecuador, the Department of War executed targeted action to advance our shared objective of dismantling narco-terrorist networks,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell wrote on X.
The operation followed a similar U.S-Ecuador operation announced by U.S. Southern Command earlier this week.
