00:00In the United States, a group of Senate Judiciary Democrats sent a letter to Chairman Chuck Grassley
00:05urging him to hold a hearing on the Trump administration's extrajudicial executions of alleged drug traffickers
00:10via military strikes on boats at sea, which have killed at least 95 people so far.
00:16In the missive, the senators alerted these strikes are extrajudicial killings
00:19and shocking violations of fundamental principles of due process and the right to life under U.S. and international law.
00:25The administration claims that the people it is killing are guilty of crimes
00:29do not render these extrajudicial killings any less unlawful.
00:33In this context, the letter urges this committee must address the serious concern
00:37that these strikes may violate U.S. criminal laws under the Department of Justice attorneys
00:41who gave President Trump and Secretary Hesketh legal code to summarily execute suspected criminals
00:47have violated their ethical obligations.
00:50Furthermore, the Democrats requested Chairman Grassley to immediately convene a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing
00:54to ensure that those who authorize these extrajudicial killings are held to account.
00:59There is not, nor can there be, any justification for state-sanctioned extrajudicial killings.
01:05In addition, the Senate Judiciary Democrats warned how instead of intensifying drug trafficking efforts,
01:10President Trump has weakened them.
01:12Just recently, he pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, the former president of Honduras,
01:17who was convicted of helping to smuggle 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S.
01:22Finally, the letter stresses that the U.S. people want real solutions to the crime
01:26and the drug epidemic, not extrajudicial killings committed in their name.
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