Posts Tagged ‘missile attacks’

Pakistan: US drones killed 123 civilians, three al-Qaeda men in January

February 1, 2010

By Amir Mir, The News International, Feb 1, 2010

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LAHORE: Afghanistan-based US predators carried out a record number of 12 deadly missile strikes in the tribal areas of Pakistan in January 2010, of which 10 went wrong and failed to hit their targets, killing 123 innocent Pakistanis. The remaining two successful drone strikes killed three al-Qaeda leaders, wanted by the Americans.

The rapid increase in the US drone attacks in the Pakistani tribal areas bordering Afghanistan can be gauged from the fact that only two such strikes were carried out in January 2009, which killed 36 people. The highest number of drone attacks carried out in a single month in 2009 was six, which were conducted in December last year. But the dawn of the New Year has already seen a dozen such attacks.

The unprecedented rise in the predator strikes with the beginning of the year 2010 is being attributed to December 30, 2009 suicide bombing in the Khost area of Afghanistan bordering North Waziristan, which killed seven CIA agents. US officials later identified the bomber as Humam Khalil Abu Mulal al-Balawi, a Jordanian national linked to both al-Qaeda and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

In a subsequent posthumous video tape released by Al-Jazeera, Balawi claimed while sitting next to TTP Chief Commander Hakimullah Mehsud that he would blow himself up in the CIA base to avenge the killing of former TTP chief Baitullah Mehsud in a US drone attack. The consequent increase in US strikes, first in North Waziristan and then South Waziristan, specifically targeting the fugitive TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud clearly shows that revenge is the major motive for these attacks. The US intelligence sleuths stationed in Afghanistan are convinced the Khost suicide attack was planned in Waziristan with the help of the TTP. Therefore, it is believed Afghanistan-based American drones will continue to hunt the most wanted al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders, especially Hakimullah, with a view to avenge the loss of the seven CIA agents and to raise morale of its forces in Afghanistan.

According to the data compiled by the interior ministry, the first US drone strike was conducted on January 1 which struck a vehicle near Ghundikala village in North Waziristan and killed four people. The second attack came on January 3, targeting the Mosakki village in North Waziristan, killing five people. Two separate missile strikes carried out on January 6 killed 35 people in Sanzalai village of North Waziristan. The fifth predator attack was carried out on January 8 in the Tappi village of North Waziristan, killing five people. The sixth attack on January 9 in Ismail Khan village of North Waziristan killed four people, including two al-Qaeda leaders. Mahmoud Mehdi Zeidan, the bodyguard for al-Qaeda leader Sayeed al-Masri, and Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim, who had been involved in hijacking of Pan Am Flight 73 in 1986, were reportedly killed in this missile strike.

The seventh US attack on January 14 in the Pasalkot village of North Waziristan killed 15 people, amidst rumours Hakimullah Mehsud could be among the dead.

The eighth drone attack came on January 15 in the Zannini village near Mir Ali in North Waziristan, killing 14 people, including an al-Qaeda-linked terrorist, Abdul Basit Usman, a Filipino wanted by the Americans. The ninth strike was carried out on January 17 in the Shaktoi area of South Waziristan, which killed 23 people. The tenth drone attack came on January 19 when two missiles were fired at a compound and vehicle in Booya village of Datakhel subdivision, 35km west of Miramshah, in North Waziristan, killing eight people. The eleventh strike carried out on January 29 targeting a compound belonging to the Haqqani network in the Muhammad Khel town of North Waziristan, killed six people. The twelfth and the last predator attack of the month came on January 30, killing nine people in the Lend Mohammad Khel area of North Waziristan.


Right-wing mad militarist and his mindless murdering drones

August 27, 2009
By Laura Flanders
Online Journal Guest Writer


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A US drone firing missiles into a village in northern Pakistan killed at least 19 people over the weekend. The targets were militants, said the US military. The victims included six dead children, said a local tribal elder.

“Suspected US Drone Kills Suspected Taliban Commander.” That’s becoming the stuff of very suspect news stories. The reporting is so weak there’s almost nothing confirmed except that the killer operator is far away in front of a computer screen.

Suspected killing of suspected people covered by unsuspicious media? It would be sci-fi if it weren’t so here-now, and it’s only going to get more so.

The Democratic administration just made a big deal of cutting the cumbersome F-22 fighter jet. “We don’t need it anymore,” said the president. What he didn’t say is that the defense department is seeking $3.5 billion for unmanned aerial vehicles, a.k.a., “drones.” Funding is expected to increase to $55 billion by 2020. The air force is currently training more drone operators than fighter and bomber pilots.

Drones have been around since the US-led NATO war on the former Yugoslavia. Since ’06, drones have launched hundred of missiles along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border killing as many as 700 civilians, according to Pakistani officials.

Forbes magazine’s “king of the armed drone makers” is a little known company called General Atomics, whose founder, James Neal Blue, came up with the drone as a way of defeating Soviet-backed Sandinistas by blowing up oil pipelines in Nicaragua. He’s a fervent anti-communist and quite possibly the next Erik Prince — only his mercenaries aren’t Blackwater’s flesh and blood killers, but conveniently bloodless machines.

General Atomics is small by defense industry standards, but it has a lot of friends in Washington. Between 2000 and 2005, GA was the top corporate sponsor of privately funded congressional travel. So perhaps it’s no surprise, there’s little resistance to more drones in the US arsenal.

Drones are not cheap — between $10 million and $12 million apiece per GA “Reaper.” Their success rate is widely disputed. They kill civilians and even General David Petraeus admits, they make people hate us. But cynical political calculus is on General Atomics’ side.

President Obama has a problem. Every American military commander wants more troops, but resistance among foot soldiers is growing and maybe, someday — someday — the president’s antiwar base will make itself heard.

How to heed the commanders and quiet the critics simultaneously? Welcome to the super drone bonanza. The pilotless drone is the military’s version of cash for very clunky policy.

The F Word is a regular commentary by Laura Flanders, the host of GRITtv which broadcasts weekdays on satellite TV (Dish Network Ch. 9415 Free Speech TV) on cable, and online at GRITtv.org and TheNation.com. Follow GRITtv or GritLaura on Twitter.com.

Indo-US Terrorism in Pakistan?

October 23, 2008

By Dr Abdul Ruff Colachal

It is crudely painful to know the Pakistan is engaged in killing Muslims of Pakistan with the help of USA and India via Afghanistan. Recently, a lot of Muslims are being butchered by these trio-“democrats” in this Islamic nation and that is a shameful event. Missiles thought to have been fired by the US have killed at least seven students of a religious school in north-western Pakistan. At least two missiles, reportedly fired by pilotless US drones, hit the school early on Oct 23. One does not what exactly the USA wants in Pakistan by destabilizing and terrorizing citizens of that country. The school, in North Waziristan, is close to the residence of a fugitive Taleban leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani and by killing these innocent school kids, USA has possible tried to reduce the Muslim population in a Muslim country with the help of Indian Hindus who always talk filth about Indian Muslims saying they are growing at a reckless speed and they have 30 million share in the 1 billion of India and that poor Hindus have stopped producing children long back. America is, then, appeasing it newly found nuclear partner in many ways.

The latest missile attack comes hours after the Pakistani parliament unanimously adopted a resolution calling on the government to defend its sovereignty and expel foreign fighters from the region. The resolution also called upon the government to prevent the use of Pakistani territory for attacks on another country. The Pakistani army is investigating the incident. The US has made no comment. It seems both USA, the global terrorist state and India, the regional terror state, have coerced Pakistan to be silent on the US-led terror wars in Islamic world including Pakistan and accommodate the Into-US “concerns” in Pakistan. Witnesses told the BBC that the missiles destroyed nearly half of the school building in the Dande Darpakhel area near Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan. At least six people were injured in the attack. It is still not clear whether there were any foreign fighters among the dead students. Local people have said that most of the injured were local students at the seminary. The residential complex of Jalaluddin Haqqani had been targeted by a previous missile attack, in which more than 10 people had been killed or injured.

In recent weeks the United States has launched several missile strikes against suspected militant targets in the Afghan border region. Any support for Muslims is treated as act of terrorism. Muslim fighters from Uzbekistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East sympathizing with the terrorized global Muslims are the target of Indo-US state terrorists. Intelligence failures have sometimes led to civilian casualties and in Islamic world that does not matter to anti-Islamic terrorists led by the USA. Washington is least worried about Muslim civilian casualties and simply covers it up by saying the strikes are used against “suspected” militant targets. Some 80 people have been killed in a number of suspected US missile strikes in South and North Waziristan region over the past month.

Earlier in October a suspected pilotless American drone fired missiles in North Waziristan, killing at least six people. The United States rarely confirms or denies such attacks, as India does it when they kill innocent Kashmiri civilians. They have least regard for Muslim human lives.

Pakistan has been on the hit list of India and one cannot firmly say if the recent cross-border trade would eventually remove the “cross-border-terrorism” mentality of India. Indian media and intelligence not seem to be really interested in peace with India, although on US pressure both are doing this kind of CBMs. The Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the military based premier spy agency of India created in 1968, has assumed a significant status as invisible actor in formulation of India’s domestic, regional and global policies, particularly directed against Muslims. It fundamental jobs include destabilize the region by engineering splits and turmoil in Indian neighborhoods. Fundamentalist Hindus give credit to Indira Gandhi who in the late 1970s gave RAW a new role to suit her Indira Doctrine specifically asking it to undertake covert operations in neighboring countries especially Pakistan which comprises majority of Muslims. RAW was given a green signal to mobilize all its resources by exploiting political turmoil in East Pakistan in 1971 which RAW had created through its agents who provided Bengalis arms and ammunition for conducting guerrilla acts against the Pakistani defence forces.

Tensions between the US and Pakistan have increased over the issue of cross-border incursions against militants by American forces based in Afghanistan. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has said he will not tolerate violations of his country’s territory. The US state department has affirmed “its support for Pakistan’s sovereignty, independence, unity, and territorial integrity”. But the US-led terrorist attacks are on the increase inside Pakistan, known as a major non-NATO ally and a “respected”, crucial partner of the USA. No one can clearly say what exactly has been happening in Jinnah’s Pakistan now-a-days!

Dr Abdul Ruff Colachal has been a university teacher, and has worked in various Indian institutions like JNU, Mysore University, Central Institute of English FL, etc. He is also a political commentator, researcher, and columnist. He has widely published in India and abroad, and has written about state terrorism.