![mehreenkasana:
On the issue of the transparency of drones program, Pakistani journalist Madiha Tahir says:
When I come to the United States and I talk to human rights advocates, the main concern about drones with respect to Pakistan is that drones in Pakistan are being controlled by the CIA instead of the military. So, the logic and demand is that drones should be shifted from the CIA to the military and this would create more transparency and accountability. And, so, there’s a lot of rhetoric about transparency and accountability as if that is the endgame. But, that is not the endgame.
First of all, it’s not clear that if having JSOC, which is an arm of the military, would be more transparent and accountable. But aside from that, this is a legal problem and an abstract problem from the point of view of survivors and families of drone attack victims. [Pakistanis] simply want to stop having the bombs dropped on their heads and it doesn’t matter if the bombs come courtesy of the CIA or they come courtesy of the military. That is really the issue that the antiwar movement has to be dealing with if it is a movement that cares about and claims to stand in solidarity with the people who are on the receiving end of American militarism.
[via]
Agreed. Pakistani lawyer Shahzad Akbar and Co-Founder of Foundation for Fundamental Rights, an organization representing victims of drone strikes in Pakistani courts was also present and spoke of the human rights violation under drone attacks at the international conference on drone warfare that took place in Washington over the weekend. Medea Benjamin, author of Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control, said: “So many people who spoke out against George [W.] Bush’s extraordinary rendition and Guantánamo and indefinite detention have been very quiet when it comes to the Obama administration, who is not putting people in those same kind of conditions, instead is just taking them out and killing them,” Benjamin says. “So we need to make people speak up and say that when Obama says this [program] is on a tight leash, this is not true, this is a lie.”
Furthermore Mr. Akbar said: “I think people are scared. They’re definitely scared. I’ve seen some people. I’ve seen—I’ve interviewed some neighbors whose next-door house was hit, and I could feel that what—what they’re feeling, because they’re feeling this imminent threat. And they are actually feeling helpless at the same time because they have no other place to relocate, because they’ve—a lot of them have no skills, no education, so they cannot relocate in any other part of Pakistan.”
You can read more about the expanding drone program by Obama here and the full transcript between Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, Shahzad Akbar and Medea Benjamin in the lower half of the page. You can follow Madiha Tahir on Twitter.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3jx3bTfhz1qamcl6o1_500.png)
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13594 listens (download link)they made the last canadian penny today let’s remember and give thanks to all the good times