U.S. involved in fishing boat attacks off Ecuador: HRW report

In this May 2, 2020, photo, birds fly over fishing and tourist boats anchored in the bay of San Cristobal, Galapagos Islands, Ecuador. (AP Photo/Adrian Vasquez)

The United States likely played a role in attacks on three fishing vessels off Ecuador’s coast earlier this year that left at least eight people missing, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Tuesday.

The nonprofit group also criticized alleged instances of torture during Ecuador’s U.S.-backed military campaign against organized crime, particularly during an operation in March along the Colombia border.

The attacks at sea allegedly occurred between January and March, after the U.S. military in September 2025 began controversial strikes on boats it claimed to be transporting drugs near Latin America, in attacks it publicly documented with video and purported casualty counts.

At least 215 people were killed in those strikes, which rights groups, including HRW, have condemned as extrajudicial killings because they have apparently targeted civilians who do not pose an immediate threat to the United States.

HRW said the attacks it investigated were not among those announced by the U.S. military.

“Between January and March, the fishing vessels La Negra Francisca Duarte II and the Don Maca came under attack in the Eastern Pacific. A third vessel, the Fiorella, disappeared on January 20 with eight of its crew members,” HRW said in an investigative report.

“The U.S. Department of Defense and Coast Guard have denied responsibility for the attacks,” HRW said, but the investigation -- which involved interviews with 62 people, including 13 survivors of the attacks -- concludes the United States “had some level of involvement in, or knowledge of, these attacks.”

“On March 17 and 26, crew members of La Negra Francisca Duarte II and the Don Maca, respectively, said they were attacked by armed drones,” according to the report, titled “A Dangerous Partnership: Abuses, Unanswered Questions, and U.S.-Ecuador Security Cooperation.”

“Survivors said that armed U.S. nationals wearing military-style uniforms bearing U.S. flag insignias detained them aboard a nearby blue-and-white vessel, and then transferred them to the Salvadoran Coast Guard,” it continued.

HRW also probed a joint U.S.-Ecuador military operation in March, in the village of San Martin along the Colombian border -- an area considered a hotspot for drug and arms trafficking.

“What we found is that what really happened is that the Ecuadorian military descended on the community, arrested four farm workers, arbitrarily detained them, tortured them -- including waterboarding one -- including beatings, electric shock, and mock executions,” HRW deputy executive director Federico Borello told a press conference Tuesday.

The detainees were allegedly taken to a military base, tortured and interrogated again, and then released without charges, according to the investigation.

“The U.S. Congress should demand clear answers from the Trump administration to the many questions surrounding its security cooperation with Ecuador,” the report concludes.