News
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Drone programme in Pakistan won’t be abandoned, says US
ISLAMABAD: The US will not abandon its drone programme in Pakistan but how it goes forward is a matter for the US, Pakistani intelligence and military officials to determine, a US official said on Wednesday.
“The programme is something that we have said we go ahead on. The question is how. And that process is going to be something that is going to be one of the main tasks that our intel and our military guys have,” the official said.
The comments came as Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, visited Pakistan in the highest level trip by a US official since ties were badly strained over the case of CIA contractor Raymond Davis, who shot dead two Pakistanis in Lahore on January 27.
A Pakistani court acquitted Davis of murder charges last month after a deal that involved the payment of compensation, or ‘blood money’, to the families of the two men that he killed.
In the wake of the incident, some Pakistani officials have called for sharp cuts in drone attacks, an issue that was raised in talks last week in Washington between CIA Director Leon Panetta and Lieutenant General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, chief of the Inter-Services Intelligence agency. “I will pause from my normal optimism and say this is a tough one. This is a real tough one,” the official said.
“Because that has been so inflamed in the public that the ability of our intelligence and our military guys to get together and say ‘what’s our common ground here’ is limited.” reuters
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk