In a rare public discussion on the US use of drones for targeted killings, a key panel on the Capitol Hill engaged in intense questioning of the basis and rationale of the secret operations when John Brennan, Obama’s pick for next CIA director, appeared for his confirmation hearing.
At the onset of hearing, Codepink activists raised the issue of civilian killings in Pakistan and elsewhere in the CIA covert operations. After repeated disruptions, Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein ordered the room be cleared.
The members of the panel asked Brennan about secrecy of the drone programme and demanded answers to questions surrounding legal basis of their use in an unprecedented way. The US has also used unmanned aerial vehicles in killing Americans suspected to be linked with al Qaeda. The United States has employed drones frequently in the last four years outside the declared war zones in countries including Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, leading to widespread international opposition to such operations on foreign soils. Islamabad has repeatedly voiced its criticism of the drone strikes in the Tribal Areas as being counterproductive to its anti-terror efforts and in contravention of the national sovereignty and international laws. In his defence, Brennan cited Washington’s continuing state of war against al Qaeda operatives but conceded there was “widespread debate” about the administration’s counterterrorism operations. He also agreed to suggestions that, when the CIA drone strikes accidentally killed civilians, those mistakes should be admitted by the United States.
US drones kill hundreds of Afghan children: UN
The United Nations’ Committee on the Rights of the Child on Friday said that the United States military attacks, including drone strikes, have killed hundreds of children in Afghanistan over the last four years. The Geneva-based committee said the casualties were ‘due notably to reported lack of precautionary measures and indiscriminate use of force’. The committee was reviewing a range of US policies affecting children for the first time since 2008. In the report, the UN committee told the US to ‘take concrete and firm precautionary measures and prevent indiscriminate use of force to ensure that no further killings and maiming of civilians, including children, take place’. Human rights and civil liberties groups applauded the UN committee’s findings and recommendations. Meanwhile, US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said that she was not aware of the UN report and would look into it.
