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The family of one Trinidadian fisherman believed to have been killed in one of 22 US boat strikes in the southern Caribbean months ago is weighing whether to file a human-rights petition, joining growing regional backlash to a campaign of lethal kinetic sea attacks that have thus far killed 86.

Relatives of 26-year-old Chad Joseph, of Las Quevas, say that they too are considering filing a human rights petition in the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR), after the family of Colombian fisherman Alejandro Andres Carranza Medina, did the same last week.

The complaint on behalf of Carranza’s family, submitted through Pittsburg Attorney Dan Kovalik, seeks to challenge the US’ boat-strike campaign and procure compensation for relatives in the aftermath of his death. It is the first of its kind since the US began striking alleged drug-carrying vessels on September 2, and amid its military build-up of multiple warships, the USS Gerald R Ford Aircraft Carrier and 15,000 troops in the Caribbean.