International Crisis Group

Drone Strikes In Pakistan ‘Ineffective’ | Sky News

US drone strikes targeting militants in the tribal area of Pakistan have been ineffective at preventing attacks on Nato troops, a new report has concluded.

The International Crisis Group report says that drone strikes have killed a significant number of al Qaeda leaders and commanders of the Pakistan and Afghan Taliban, but also scores of innocent civilians.

Since 2004, there have been at least 350 drone strikes in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) - mostly in North Waziristan, South Waziristan and Kurram.

But the report criticises the killing of civilians through “signature” strikes that target groups of men based on behaviour patterns associated with terrorist activity rather than known identities.

FULL ARTICLE (Sky News)

Photo: UK Ministry of Defence/Flickr

Jubaland in Jeopardy: The Uneasy Path to State-Building in Somalia

from Crisis Group’s blog, The African Peacebuilding Agenda

On 15 May 2013, Sheikh Ahmed Madobe, leader of the Ras Kamboni militia and a close ally of Kenya, was elected Jubaland president by regional clan representatives. Hours later, Barre Hirale, a warlord from a rival clan allied with the Somali Federal Government (SFG), declared himself president. The effort to create a Jubaland state within Somalia will test the limits of federalism in that country, and threatens to touch off clan warfare not only within Somalia but also in its neighbours.

We spoke to Zakaria Yusuf, Somalia Analyst , and Claire Elder, Horn of Africa Research Assistant, to learn more about Jubaland and find out if there is a risk of conflict.

Click here to read the Q & A.

Image reproduced with permission of Asempa Limited, publisher of Africa Confidential (www.africa-confidential.com). Original map first appeared in Africa Confidential, Vol. 52, No. 22, 4 November 2011.

Did you know these facts about the United States’ drone program in Pakistan?

• Washington and Islamabad have no official agreement regarding U.S. drone strikes on Pakistani territory.
• Since it does not officially acknowledge the CIA-run drone program in Pakistan, the U.S. government provides no breakdown of casualties.
• Some communities in targeted provinces in Pakistan have become reluctant to hold funerals lest they attract drone strikes.
• The U.S. government claims that targeted killings are a legally justified response to the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks. International legal experts have challenged this assumption that the U.S. can, more than a decade later and outside an active battlefield, still be at war with those it holds responsible and invoke the laws of war when targeting them.
• Unlike international humanitarian law, international human rights law does not countenance the killing of civilians or bystanders.

Read more in our latest report, Drones: Myths and Reality in Pakistan

President Obama is scheduled to deliver a speech on U.S. drone policy this Thursday. If you’d like to read up in advance, check out today’s report, Drones: Myths And Reality In Pakistan, which digs down into what the CIA-run program has truly achieved in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

Photos: Flickr/Todd Huffman/Argonne National Laboratory

Drones: Myths and Reality in Pakistan

Islamabad/Washington/Brussels  |   21 May 2013

Drone strikes alone will not eliminate the jihadi threat in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Extension of Pakistani law and full constitutional rights to the region is the only long-term solution.

In its latest report, Drones: Myths and Reality in Pakistan, the International Crisis Group examines the extensive CIA-led program of drone strikes in Pakistan. The report argues that the U.S. needs to be transparent about its drone policies and bring them in accord with legality and enhanced congressional oversight and judicial accountability, while Pakistan must live up to its responsibility for governance and security in FATA.

The report’s major findings and recommendations are:

• Pakistan’s new civilian leadership under PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif must make the extension of the state’s writ in FATA the centrepiece of its counter-terrorism agenda, bringing violent extremists to justice and thus diminishing Washington’s perceived need to conduct drone strikes in Pakistan’s tribal belt.
• Drones are not a long-term solution to the problem they are being deployed to address, since the jihadi groups in FATA will continue to recruit as long as the region remains an ungoverned no-man’s land.
• The U.S., while pressuring the Pakistan military to end all support to violent extremists, should also support civilian efforts to bring FATA into the constitutional and legal mainstream.
• The lack of candour from the U.S. and Pakistan governments on the drone program undermines efforts to assess its legality or its full impact on FATA’s population. The U.S. refuses to officially acknowledge the program; Pakistan portrays it as a violation of national sovereignty, but ample evidence exists of tacit Pakistani consent and, at times, active cooperation.
• Pakistan must ensure that its actions and those of the U.S. comply with the principles of distinction and proportionality under international humanitarian law. Independent observers should have access to targeted areas, where significant military and militant-imposed barriers have made accurate assessments of the program’s impact, including collateral damage, nearly impossible.
• The U.S. should cease any practices, such as “signature strikes”, that do not comply with international humanitarian law. The U.S. should develop a legal framework that defines clear roles for the executive, legislative and judicial branches, converting the drone program from a covert CIA operation to a military-run program with a meaningful level of judicial and Congressional oversight.

“The core of any Pakistani counter-terrorism strategy in this area should be to incorporate FATA into the country’s legal and constitutional mainstream”, says Samina Ahmed, Crisis Group’s Senior Asia Adviser. “For Pakistan, the solution lies in overhauling an anachronistic governance system so as to establish fundamental constitutional rights and genuine political enfranchisement in FATA, along with a state apparatus capable of upholding the rule of law and bringing violent extremists to justice”.

FULL REPORT