Interceptions of U.S. Marines targeting Ecuadorian fishing vessels, which are subsequently bombed on the grounds that they are suspected collaborators in drug trafficking, have been livestreamed on TikTok and recorded on video by the affected crews themselves to alert their families and document their location.
Some crew members have begun filming videos or streaming from the moment U.S. forces' helicopters surround them in Pacific waters. "Share this — the helicopter is on us. Here they come, they're going to board us," a voice can be heard saying in one of the audiovisual recordings that went viral on social media in recent days.
"Here comes the 'boat sinker,'" says the man filming, as a small vessel is seen approaching them.
In another case, one of the crew members aboard the X Siempre Don Carlos — intercepted and bombed last Tuesday by the Joint Interagency Task Force West — warned that they were adrift due to damage to the vessel, gave their location, and said he was recording a video "just in case" something happened to them, as they had begun hearing a helicopter and could see a vessel heading toward them.
Meanwhile, one of those aboard the María Candelaria, which was sunk on September 5, streamed live until one of the Marines took away his phone.
The boarding scenes are very similar across nearly all the streams and videos published over the past three weeks. In one recording, Marines can even be heard ordering the crew to put their hands on their heads and kneel; in another, which comes from the security cameras of one of the vessels, soldiers can be seen inspecting different areas of the boat.
Eight Ecuadorian vessels have been bombed by U.S. forces since August 28, when the Southern Command began reporting the attacks, carried out in coordination with the Ecuadorian government.
The boats are accused of allegedly operating as floating fuel resupply stations for speedboats carrying drugs toward North America.
Their crew members are accused of allegedly having ties to Los Choneros, the oldest criminal group in the Andean nation, associated with the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel and one of four Ecuadorian gangs designated as terrorist organizations by the U.S. government.
At least 56 crew members have been released after judges found no evidence of a crime, while another 78 were granted conditional release after being charged with alleged unlawful association.
Ecuador's Defense Minister, Gian Carlo Loffredo, said this week that the United States had been monitoring these vessels beforehand and that many of them "already have prior records" of having been found "with drugs or with fuel, for hydrocarbon trafficking."
