In September of 2012, Pakistan withdrew consent for any drone strikes within their borders

[cali]

The U.S. Has not stopped its ILLEGAL drone strikes in Pakistan.

Last Friday there was a drone strike in Pakistan. 10 days before that there was another.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/global/2013/06/pakistans-answer-us-drone-defiance/66032/

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/global/2012/09/us-isnt-waiting-pakistans-permission-drone-strikes/57285/


It's illegal and it's counterproductive.

US drone attacks are further radicalising Pakistan

The US airstrike last week, which killed the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) second in command Wali ur Rehman has again raised the contentious issue about the legality of US drone strikes in Pakistan. The United States, like many of its allies across the international community were quick to hail this operation a success. Yet underneath this bravado lays a very serious question and that is" despite killing high profile figures such as Wali ur Rehman and Baitullah Mehsud in 2009, the methods used to target the Taliban may in actual fact be acting as a recruitment tool for extremist organisations in Pakistan who have an apathy towards the Taliban.

The latest airstrike came as the dust was settling from the recent Pakistani elections. At a crucial time when the TPP were willing to hold "peace talks" with the new Pakistani Nawaz Sharif administration, this US airstrike seems to again have reignited anti-US/Pak relations. The drone strikes are mainly used in the federally administered tribal areas, and whilst accurate statistics about the number of drone strikes and casualties are difficult to ascertain because of the nature of access, the Bureau of Investigative Journalists has argued that at least 2,541 to 3,540 people have been killed in drone attacks and almost 411 to 884 of those are civilians.

When Imran Khan, the cricketer turned politician and leader of the Pakistani Tehreek-e-Insaf party famously said he would shoot down a drone if elected as Pakistan's next prime minister, many commentators viewed it as light satire appealing to the middle class vote. Yet his statement does appear to represent the majority of Pakistani's views on drone attacks. A 2011 Pew poll of drone attacks, for example, showed that 89% of Pakistani citizens argue that drones kill innocent people. Moreover, a report published by Stanford and New York Universities in 2011 showed the scale of the psychological impact drone attacks had on Pakistani civilians who felt "terrorised" by them.

The most damning piece of evidence against the use of drone strikes was in March 2011 when 40 people were killed, many of whom were civilians at a local tribal meeting. Thus, public perception of drones in Pakistan is one that portrays a lack of trust and confidence in the Pakistani government for its pro-drone stance which has inevitably left a vacuum for extremist groups like the TPP and others that gives them an opportunity to amplify their actions and raise the public alarm through a number of well-coordinated and sophisticated terrorist assaults upon the public.

<snip>

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/02/us-drone-strikes-pakistan-terrorists

Go ahead, defend this shit.