The 'shoot to kill' by Malaysian police personnel was bad - but many were allegedly situations where the people shot (or some of them) had allegedly started firing at the police....but in this cases, US drones are un-manned. There are no 'firing at' happening. Innocents are being killed....and the whole world choses to ignore this - not demanding even an answer from the US under Obama.
Rule of Law - right to defend oneself ...right to a fair trial??
Amnesty International is also silent....why? Are Pakistanis lesser humans - and so we are not at all concerned.
At least six missile attacks from suspected US drones have killed eight people and wounded five others in the Pakistani province of South Waziristan near the Afghan border. - Al-jazeera, 8/7/2009, Deadly missiles strike PakistanReuters...have a report on this, and we note that there only 7 (and that too 'suspected' ) al-Qaeda/Taliban persons have been killed so far, from almost 430 persons killed by reason of these un-manned US drones. How many men? How many women? How many children? What were their names? Is this not murder? But, why is the UN....the EU...the World...the OIC...Malaysia not protesting this ongoing killing of innocents? Pakistan's protest have also been wanting...
Suspected U.S. drones fired six missiles into a Pakistani Taliban training camp near the Afghan border on Wednesday, killing six militants, government and intelligence agency officials said.Will Najib, Anwar, Lim Kit Siang, Hadi, Syed Husin Ali...protest this killing of innocents by the US in Pakistan? Or will they too turn a blind eye when it comes to US's violations of human rights?The pre-dawn attack was in the South Waziristan region, in a stronghold of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, they said.
Here are some facts about the U.S. missile attacks, the controversy they have caused, and a list of some of the more prominent militants killed, according to Pakistani officials.
WHY DOES THE UNITED STATES ATTACK?
Many al Qaeda members and Taliban fled to northwestern Pakistan's ungoverned ethnic Pashtun belt after U.S.-led soldiers ousted Afghanistan's Taliban government in 2001. From their sanctuaries there the militants have orchestrated insurgencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The United States and Afghanistan have pressed Pakistan to eliminate the sanctuaries. Apparently frustrated by Pakistan's inability to do so, the United States is hitting the militants itself.
HOW MANY ATTACKS?
The United States has carried out about 46 drone air strikes since the beginning of last year, most since September, killing about 430 people, including many foreign militants, according to a tally of reports from Pakistani intelligence agents, district government officials and residents.
SOME OF THE PEOPLE REPORTED KILLED
January 28, 2008 - A senior al Qaeda member, Abu Laith al-Libi, was killed in a strike in North Waziristan.
July 28 - An al Qaeda chemical and biological weapons expert, Abu Khabab al-Masri, was killed in South Waziristan.
November 22 - Rashid Rauf, a Briton with al Qaeda links and the suspected ringleader of a 2006 plot to blow up airliners over the Atlantic, was killed in an attack in North Waziristan. An Egyptian named as Abu Zubair al-Masri was said to be among the dead in the same attack.
January 1, 2009 - A U.S. drone killed three foreign fighters in South Waziristan, Pakistani agents said. A week later, a U.S. counter-terrorism official said al Qaeda's operational chief Usama al-Kini and an aide had been killed in South Waziristan. The U.S. official declined to say how or when they died.
WHERE ARE THE DRONES LAUNCHED FROM?
A senior U.S. lawmaker, Senator Dianne Feinstein, told a U.S. Senate hearing in February that drones were being operated and flown from an air base inside Pakistan. Pakistan denied that, saying there was no permission for the strikes, nor had there ever been.
U.S. POSITION
The United States has shrugged off Pakistani protests. It says the missile strikes are carried out under an agreement with Islamabad which allows Pakistani leaders to decry the attacks in public.
U.S. officials said last month the United States had given Pakistan data on militants in the Afghan border area gathered by surveillance drones in Pakistani airspace under an agreement with Pakistan.
PAKISTAN'S POSITION
Pakistan says the drone strikes violate its sovereignty and undermine efforts to deal with militancy because they inflame public anger and bolster support for the militants. Pakistan has pressed the United States to provide it with drones to allow it to conduct its own anti-militant operations.
(Compiled by Islamabad Newsroom; Editing by Robert Birsel and Jerry Norton) - Reuters, 8/7/2009, FACTBOX: U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan
Remember also that all is presumed innocent until proven guilty...
See also earlier posts:-
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1 comment:
They are innocent? This is when terms like 'suspected militants' would come in handy.
Anwar's circle of friends include Paul Wolfowitz.
Najib's circle of friends include Donald Rumsfeld.
Lim Kit Siang sides with America a few weeks after 9/11 by breaking away from Barisan Alternatif.
Hadi Awang does not want to be linked with Al-Qaeda.
Syed Husin Ali is not a party leader, so let's spare him from any obligation to issue statement.
Unless..... all these leaders are already or planning to commit human right violation and later say that 'Americans can, why we cannot?' when the US government criticizes Malaysia's human rights record.
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