5 Pakistanis Killed in US Missile Drone Missile Attack, August 28, 2010

5 Pakistanis Killed in US Missile Drone Missile Attack

August 28, 2010

Drone strike kills four Taliban fighters in Kurram Agency

The Daily Times, Pakistan, Saturday, August 28, 2010

PESHAWAR:

A US drone strike on Saturday killed four (Pakistani Taliban fighters) in the Tribal Areas near the Afghan border, security officials said. The strike hit Shahidano village in Kurram Agency, around 100 kilometres southwest of Peshawar.

“Four (Taliban fighters) have been killed in this drone attack,” a security official in Peshawar told AFP by telephone. Another security official in Peshawar said the US drone fired four missiles, hitting two vehicles near a house.

“All those killed were terrorists belonging to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP),” the official said. According to the US, the drone strikes had been counter-productive as a large number of Taliban and al Qaeda-linked terrorists had been killed in the attacks.

On the other hand, Pakistan insists that the US provide Islamabad with the drone technology so that the Pakistan Army could carry out the attacks itself. afp

Five killed in U.S. strike in Pakistan - officials

Reuters, August 28, 2010

U.S. drone aircraft have attacked suspected militants in northwest Pakistan, near the border with Afghanistan, killing five people, Pakistani officials said on Saturday.

Shots were also fired near the U.S. consulate in the northwestern city of Peshawar and an unknown number of gunmen were surrounded in a building but there had been no casualties, authorities said.

The drone attack, in the Kurram ethnic Pashtun tribal region, was the latest in a U.S. campaign aimed at eliminating (alleged) Al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters who base themselves in northwest Pakistan and attack U.S-led forces in Afghanistan.

"There were attacks in three different places on Friday evening," said a government official in the region, who declined to be identified.

Two of the missiles hit vehicles carrying suspected militants. It was not clear if the three attacks were carried out by one or more aircraft, they said.

The identity of the five dead was not known while several suspected militants were wounded, the officials said.

U.S. ally Pakistan officially objects to the attacks by pilotless drone aircraft, saying they violate its sovereignty and enrage the Pashtun tribes in the lawless border regions, complicating its efforts to stamp out militancy.

But Pakistan has cooperated in planning at least some of the attacks, officials from both countries have said.

In Peshawar, the main city in the northwest where there have been numerous militant attacks in recent years, security forces had surrounded a building where gunmen who had earlier fired some shots were holed up, a senior official said.

The gunmen's target was not immediately clear. The U.S. consulate and its staff have been attacked twice in the past couple of years.

"Everyone is their target," said provincial government minister Bashir Bilour. "You are the target, we are the target, army, police, Americans -- all are their targets."

(Reporting by Javed Hussain and Faris Ali; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Fair Use Notice

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.