Colombian President Gustavo Petro has warned that attacking his country's sovereignty is tantamount to declaring war, after Donald Trump said any country trafficking illegal drugs into the US could be attacked.
"Anybody that's doing that and selling it into our country is subject to attack," the US President told reporters during a cabinet meeting at the White House, after raising the issue of cocaine from Colombia.
Mr Petro rebuked Mr Trump's remarks in a post on X.
He said the South American nation destroys a drug-producing laboratory every 40 minutes "without missiles".
Mr Trump has launched an offensive on alleged drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean and Pacific in recent months, killing dozens of people through targeted missile strikes.
US military forces have built up in the Caribbean, with tensions rising between Mr Trump and Nicolas Maduro, the president of Venezuela, which borders Colombia.
The Trump administration alleges Mr Maduro plays a key role in supplying illegal drugs that have killed Americans.
Mr Maduro denies the claim and insists there is no drug cultivation in Venezuela, which he says is used as a trafficking route for Colombian cocaine against its will.
On Tuesday, the White House said a US admiral acting under the authority of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the "double-tap" military operation that targeted survivors of an initial attack on an alleged drug smuggling boat.
A total of 11 people were killed in the two strikes - the first group of more than 80 left dead in what has become a months-long campaign against alleged drug-runners that experts say amounts to extrajudicial killings.
Mr Hegseth insisted the strikes are legal, saying in a recent post on X that the military action is "in compliance with the law of armed conflict - and approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command".
However, the military action on 2 September would appear to run afoul of the Pentagon's own Law of War Manual, which states: "For example, orders to fire upon the shipwrecked would be clearly illegal."
In recent days, Mr Trump has flagged the possibility of US military intervention in Venezuela.
He told reporters that any country that was sending illegal drugs to the US could be subject to land strikes, "not just Venezuela".
"I hear the country of Colombia is making cocaine, they have cocaine manufacturing plants and then they sell us their cocaine," he said.
Mr Petro, who has been personally sanctioned by the Trump administration, invited Mr Trump to participate in the nation's anti-drug offensive, but with a warning.
"Do not threaten our sovereignty, or you will awake the Jaguar," Mr Petro said.
"Attacking our sovereignty is declaring war," he added.
