The attack took place in the remote Drey Nishtar area of South Waziristan along the Afghan border, part of the semi-autonomous northwestern tribal belt that Washington considers a global hub of Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants.
The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) reportedly fired two missiles at the pickup truck carrying the five passengers. The vehicle caught fire, causing the bodies to be burned and making identification difficult.
One security official said the far-flung and mountainous Drey Nishtar lies on the Afghan border where militants try to cross into Afghanistan to attack US-led Nato troops who have been fighting a Taliban insurgency for 10 years.
“A US drone fired two missiles into a vehicle. Five militants have been killed,” a second Pakistani security official told AFP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media.
President Barack Obama in January confirmed for the first time that US drones target militants on Pakistani soil, but American officials do not discuss details of the covert programme.
The attacks fuel anti-American resentment in Pakistan, whose relations with the US nosedived over the covert raid that killed Osama bin Laden last May and air strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in November.
In Britain, a law firm said Sunday it would sue Foreign Secretary William Hague on behalf of a Pakistani man, whose father was killed by a drone strike, over claims that British intelligence was used to assist in attacks.
Lawyers will claim that civilian intelligence officers who pass on intelligence are not “lawful combatants”, therefore cannot claim immunity from criminal law and could be liable as “secondary parties to murder”.
They will also argue that the immunity clause does not apply as Pakistan is not currently involved in an “international armed conflict”.
The New America Foundation think-tank in Washington says drone strikes have killed between 1,715 and 2,680 people in Pakistan in the past eight years.
US diplomatic cables leaked by WikiLeaks in late 2010 showed that Pakistan’s civilian and military leaders privately supported US drone attacks, despite public condemnation in a country where the US alliance is hugely unpopular.
Islamabad is now reviewing its US alliance in the wake of the November deaths and has kept its Afghan border closed to Nato supply convoys since then.
It ordered US personnel to leave the Shamsi air base in southwestern Pakistan, widely believed to have been a hub for the CIA drone programme, and is thought likely to impose taxes on convoys if it reopens the Afghan border.
According to an AFP tally, 45 US missile strikes were reported in Pakistan’s tribal belt in 2009, the year Obama took office, 101 in 2010 and 64 in 2011. Tuesday’s attack was the ninth reported so far this year.
In North Waziristan, gunmen on Tuesday shot dead the top government official in the town of Mir Ali, Azmat Jamal, after barging into his office, Pakistani security officials said.
“Five gunmen managed to enter inside his office and opened fire on him, he was taken to hospital where he died,” one official told AFP.
“Attackers also hurled hand grenade before fleeing the scene,” a second official told AFP.
from DAWN
Washington Time
Kabul Time
London Time
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