Washington: Peeling back some of the secrecy of America’s drone strikes on suspected terrorists, the Obama administration has said it has killed up to 116 civilians in counterterror attacks in Pakistan, Yemen and other places where the US is not engaged in active, on-the-ground warfare.
The first-ever public assessment is a response to mounting pressure for more information about lethal US operations overseas. The report by National Intelligence Director James Clapper said the US conducted 473 counterterror strikes, including those by unmanned drones, between January 2009 and December 2015.
He did not mention where the strikes occurred, but the Defense Department and CIA have pursued targets in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Libya. The data didn’t include strikes in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan, which the US considers areas of active hostilities.
However, non-governmental organisations have a much higher estimate of civilian casualties which go as high as 900 for the same period. — Agencies
