US strikes on Ecuadorian fishing boats raise humanitarian concerns but Trump admin not wavering

US forces intercepted the Ecuadorian vessel Manta on 5 September before the vessel was destroyed. Photograph: US Marine Corps Forces, South

While the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, was being decorated in Quito by Ecuador’s president for “helping to promote peace in the region”, 10 Ecuadorian fishers whose boat had been blown up by US forces were adrift in the eastern Pacific.

On 8 September, a day before Rubio arrived, a US patrol vessel intercepted the fishing boat Don Rufo in international waters near Ecuador.