The killings mark the third attack in May alone by the US military in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The United States military said it killed two people, leaving one survivor, in its latest attack on vessels in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) announced the attack in a statement on Friday, accompanied by a video that showed a moving boat being struck by a missile and then bursting into a ball of flames.

SOUTHCOM oversees the US military operations in the Caribbean and Latin America. It said the vessel was operated by “Designated Terrorist Organizations” but provided no evidence in support of this claim.

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

It said no military forces were harmed in the operation.

This is the third attack in May. It comes a few days after the US military reported killing three people in a similar attack. 

Since the US began its operation in September targeting what the US claims are narco-traffickers, it has killed more than 170 people, although estimates vary.

The Trump administration has defended the strikes by likening drug trafficking to an armed attack on the US and designating numerous criminal groups involved in the drug trade as “terrorist” organisations.

International legal scholars, rights workers and regional leaders have dismissed the US claims, warning that the strikes constitute extrajudicial killings and that no state of armed conflict exists to justify such operations.

Experts say even if the people on the boat were involved in drug trafficking, they should face the law, rather than face fatal attacks.

Families in Colombia and Trinidad and Tobago have spoken out after past attacks, insisting those targeted were not “narco-terrorists” as the Trump administration has claimed, but fishermen and informal workers making routine journeys between the Caribbean and South America.