Accepting the figure for the success rate in killing militants nevertheless means that fully 500 or so Pakistani civilians have been killed since 2004. Unlike, say, in the war in Afghanistan, there is no investigation of civilian casualties, and no compensation paid. Transparency and accountability are absent, and some question the legal basis of the attacks. The programme is a charade because the CIA never admits to it and Pakistan pretends that it does not co-operate. A legal action launched this month, initially in Pakistan, with the backing of Reprieve, a campaigning group, seeks the arrest of a former CIA lawyer, John Rizzo, who boasted in a magazine interview this year that he used to approve a monthly list of some 30 individuals to be targeted by the drones.
Whatever the outcome of that case, a debate will grind on about whether the strikes are harming al-Qaeda and related groups, or spurring on Afghanistan’s powerful insurgency. According to the New America Foundation, out of the 2,600-odd deaths, 35 were recognised militant chiefs, or just 1.3% of the total. Among the successes was the fearsome leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud, who was the country’s number one public enemy. Still, the vast majority of targets have been low-level fighters. All the while, the number of suicide attacks in Afghanistan, many launched from Pakistan, has soared over the past year or more. Courtesy: The Economist (END)
(COURTESY: THE ECONOMIST)