Amnesty International has called on the US to “come clean” on its justification for drone attacks in Pakistan – as the human rights group revealed fresh details of civilian deaths caused by the increasingly controversial policy.
In a report published on Tuesday the watchdog said it could find no “justification for these killings” including that of a 68-year-old grandmother. The report, released just a day ahead of a White House meeting between Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and US President Barack Obama, may set the tone for the discussion, a senior Pakistan official said.
“People who are clearly no imminent threat to the US, are not fighting against the US, are being killed,” said Mustafa Qadri, the Amnesty researcher who wrote the report. “The US has to come clean publicly with the justifications for these killings”.
Amnesty cited the separate cases of grandmother Mamana Bibi, who was said to have died on October 24 2012 in North Waziristan, and 18 low-income labourers as evidence of innocent victims of drone attacks. “We were really shocked, especially with the grandmother case. At first we thought, that can’t be true – there must be something more to this” said Mr Qadri.
“There are genuine threats to the US and its allies in the region, and drone strikes may be lawful in some circumstances. But it is hard to believe that a group of labourers, or an elderly woman surrounded by her grandchildren, were endangering anyone at all, let alone posing an imminent threat to the US,” he added.
Mr Sharif is under pressure from hardliners, including Islamists and nationalists, and those who demand an end to all co-operation with the US until the drone attacks – which have been going on for almost 10 years – come to an end. His government has publicly opposed the use of the drones that have sparked large protests.
According to the London based bureau of investigative journalism, the US has carried out 376 drone attacks in Pakistan since 2004 with the death toll between 2500 and 3600 individuals. Reports in the Pakistan media have said up to one-third of those killed were civilians.
The new report comes just after the UN called on the US government to release its own figures for civilian casualties from drone strikes.
Ben Emmerson, a British lawyer who is the UN’s special rapporteur for human rights and counter-terrorism, also suggested that many of the US drone strikes could break international law.
In a report released at the end of last week, Mr Emmerson said that he did “not accept that considerations of national security justify withholding statistical and basic methodological data”.
He added that the “single greatest obstacle to an evaluation of the civilian impact of drone strikes is lack of transparency, which makes it extremely difficult to assess claims of precision targeting objectively.”
The use of drones to target alleged terrorists started under the George W Bush administration but expanded significantly under Mr Obama. However, in a speech in May, Mr Obama announced new restrictions on their use.
A senior western diplomat in Islamabad said, Pakistan’s former military ruler General Pervez Musharraf was widely believed to have verbally agreed with the US, allowing the latter to carry out drone attacks targeting militants who posed a serious threat to Pakistan’s interests. “Some of the most sought after militants have been killed by US drones in Pakistan” he said. “Unfortunately, the failure to protect civilian casualties has made their use increasingly controversial.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2013. You may share using our article tools.
Please don't cut articles from FT.com and redistribute by email or post to the web.
In a report published on Tuesday the watchdog said it could find no “justification for these killings” including that of a 68-year-old grandmother. The report, released just a day ahead of a White House meeting between Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and US President Barack Obama, may set the tone for the discussion, a senior Pakistan official said.
“People who are clearly no imminent threat to the US, are not fighting against the US, are being killed,” said Mustafa Qadri, the Amnesty researcher who wrote the report. “The US has to come clean publicly with the justifications for these killings”.
Amnesty cited the separate cases of grandmother Mamana Bibi, who was said to have died on October 24 2012 in North Waziristan, and 18 low-income labourers as evidence of innocent victims of drone attacks. “We were really shocked, especially with the grandmother case. At first we thought, that can’t be true – there must be something more to this” said Mr Qadri.
“There are genuine threats to the US and its allies in the region, and drone strikes may be lawful in some circumstances. But it is hard to believe that a group of labourers, or an elderly woman surrounded by her grandchildren, were endangering anyone at all, let alone posing an imminent threat to the US,” he added.
Mr Sharif is under pressure from hardliners, including Islamists and nationalists, and those who demand an end to all co-operation with the US until the drone attacks – which have been going on for almost 10 years – come to an end. His government has publicly opposed the use of the drones that have sparked large protests.
According to the London based bureau of investigative journalism, the US has carried out 376 drone attacks in Pakistan since 2004 with the death toll between 2500 and 3600 individuals. Reports in the Pakistan media have said up to one-third of those killed were civilians.
The new report comes just after the UN called on the US government to release its own figures for civilian casualties from drone strikes.
Ben Emmerson, a British lawyer who is the UN’s special rapporteur for human rights and counter-terrorism, also suggested that many of the US drone strikes could break international law.
In a report released at the end of last week, Mr Emmerson said that he did “not accept that considerations of national security justify withholding statistical and basic methodological data”.
He added that the “single greatest obstacle to an evaluation of the civilian impact of drone strikes is lack of transparency, which makes it extremely difficult to assess claims of precision targeting objectively.”
The use of drones to target alleged terrorists started under the George W Bush administration but expanded significantly under Mr Obama. However, in a speech in May, Mr Obama announced new restrictions on their use.
A senior western diplomat in Islamabad said, Pakistan’s former military ruler General Pervez Musharraf was widely believed to have verbally agreed with the US, allowing the latter to carry out drone attacks targeting militants who posed a serious threat to Pakistan’s interests. “Some of the most sought after militants have been killed by US drones in Pakistan” he said. “Unfortunately, the failure to protect civilian casualties has made their use increasingly controversial.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2013. You may share using our article tools.
Please don't cut articles from FT.com and redistribute by email or post to the web.