US floats prospect of joint strikes on Colombian armed groups

PANAMA CITY: US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth floated on Wednesday the possibility of joint strikes on Colombian armed groups, as he welcomed the nation into a military-led counter-narcotics coalition after its conservative president took over last week.

Colombia had authorized “joint military operations to destroy terrorists and terror networks,” Hegseth told a gathering of the US-led Americas Counter-Cartel Coalition in Panama.

“Yes,” he replied when asked if he had discussed with his Colombian counterpart joint strikes against armed groups such as the National Liberation Army (ELN), which the US designates as a terrorist group, and remnants of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.

“Designated terrorist organizations, with partnered governments, will be legitimate targets of the United States government,” to include Colombia, Hegseth said when asked if such operations were expected.

President Donald Trump’s Latin American policy has expanded dramatically beyond its early focus on the Panama ‌Canal.

More than 200 ‌people have been killed since the launch of US military strikes on suspected drug ‌boats ⁠last September, while a ⁠US-led commando raid in January deposed Nicolas Maduro, the president of Venezuela.

Critics say the US strikes amount to war crimes worthy of the International Criminal Court, but Hegseth blasted the organization and encouraged coalition allies attending the meeting in Panama to withdraw from it.

He compared drug traffickers to Al-Qaeda or Islamic State terrorists.

Speaking at a hotel in Panama City, Hegseth invoked a revamped Monroe Doctrine, the 19th-century policy asserting US primacy across the Americas that critics associate with decades of US intervention.

He has called it the “Donroe Doctrine” — a play on Trump’s name.

“We will defend our hemisphere from external threats,” including from ⁠narco-traffickers and foreign malign influence, Hegseth said.