Booooyah! Eleven Taliban, hiding in South Waziristan, were taken out by a pair of predator drones late yesterday - the significance of this strike is that it hit SOUTH Waziristan and not NORTH Waziristan. Here's some of the details from The Long War Journal:
This is a huge wake up call to the Taliban in that it reinforces that no province or agency in NW Pakistan is safe from these predator strikes - I can imagine these Taliban, having braved the risk of going back to South Waziristan, felt completely safe there....well, I guess they weren't.
The US killed 11 terrorists in airstrikes in Pakistan's lawless tribal agency of South Waziristan. The strike is the first in the tribal agency this year.
The strike, which was carried out by unmanned Predators or the more deadly Reapers, targeted "militant hideouts" in the Nezai Narai area in South Waziristan, according to Geo News. It is unclear if the strike targeted al Qaeda, the Taliban, or allied Central Asian terror groups known to operate in the tribal agency.
No senior al Qaeda or Taliban leaders have been reported killed at this time.
This is a huge wake up call to the Taliban in that it reinforces that no province or agency in NW Pakistan is safe from these predator strikes - I can imagine these Taliban, having braved the risk of going back to South Waziristan, felt completely safe there....well, I guess they weren't.
US kills 11 in Predator strike in South Waziristan
The US killed 11 terrorists in airstrikes in Pakistan's lawless tribal agency of South Waziristan. The strike is the first in the tribal agency this year.
The strike, which was carried out by unmanned Predators or the more deadly Reapers, targeted "militant hideouts" in the Nezai Narai area in South Waziristan, according to Geo News. It is unclear if the strike targeted al Qaeda, the Taliban, or allied Central Asian terror groups known to operate in the tribal agency.
No senior al Qaeda or Taliban leaders have been reported killed at this time.
The attack took place just one day after Philip Alston, the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions, called for the CIA to end the strikes in Pakistan's tribal areas. Alston claimed the program is not subject to accountability that would exist under a program run by the US military.
"With the Defense Department you’ve got maybe not perfect but quite abundant accountability as demonstrated by what happens when a bombing goes wrong in Afghanistan," Alston said in an interview with The New York Times. "The whole process that follows is very open. Whereas if the C.I.A. is doing it, by definition they are not going to answer questions, not provide any information, and not do any follow-up that we know about."
Alston's comments follow criticisms of the CIA program earlier this year by the American Civil Liberties Union, which has filed a lawsuit against the the Defense Department, the State Department, and the Justice Department, demanding enforcement of its January request for information on the program.
The US government has defended the air campaign in Pakistan, and insisted the program is in line with international laws of war and remains accountable to the US Congress.
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