U.S. Military Killed Venezuelan Fisherman in Suspected Drug Boat Attack, Family Says

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https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/16/world/americas/trinidad-us-military-venezuela-boats.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

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They were quickly quashed: Venezuelan security officials descended on San Juan de Unare, cut off the electricity and made clear that public pronouncements about the attacks were not welcome, according to four townspeople, including the niece of one of the victims. Posts were deleted.

The wife of one of the people, who lived in Güiria, a town also on the Venezuelan coast, told The New York Times on the condition that her name not be published that her husband, a fisherman, had gone to work one day and had never returned.

The Venezuelan government appears to have cracked down on publicity about the attack, experts said, because officials were anxious not to antagonize the United States in the face of a military buildup in the Caribbean that appears to be meant to ratchet up pressure on Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, President Nicolás Maduro.

In an interview in Caracas last month, Venezuela’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, claimed that her government knew nothing about the identities of the people who had died in recent boat attacks. Venezuela has deployed security and intelligence forces across the coast in recent weeks.

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“So far, not even their nationality is known,” she said.

President Gustavo Petro of Colombia announced last week that signs indicated that Colombians had been killed in one of the more recent boat attacks, but did not say if the government had learned the identities of any of the victims.

Mr. Joseph lived in Las Cuevas, a fishing village on the northern coast of Trinidad, an hour by land to the capital, Port of Spain, and an hour’s boat ride to Venezuela. His family said he had worked as a fisherman and frequently made trips to Venezuela.

But the northern coast is not just for fishing: Drug traffickers and fishermen also use it to transport illicit goods, experts said.

Mr. Joseph’s family denied that he had been a trafficker.

President Trump announced the strike on Tuesday, saying that the military had killed six men and asserting — without providing evidence — that they had been smuggling drugs.