U.N. official calls for study of ethics, legality of unmanned weapons

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Washington Post

U.N. official calls for study of ethics, legality of unmanned weapons
By Patrick Worsnip
Sunday, October 24, 2010; 12:05 AM

UNITED NATIONS - A United Nations investigator called on the world body Friday to set up a panel to study the ethics and legality of unmanned military weapons - an apparent reference to U.S. drones that have targeted suspected Islamist militants.

In a report to the U.N. General Assembly human rights committee, Christof Heyns said such systems raised "serious concerns that have been almost entirely unexamined by human rights or humanitarian actors."

"The international community urgently needs to address the legal, political, ethical and moral implications of the development of lethal robotic technologies," said Heyns, the U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions.

It was the second time this year that a U.N. official has brought up the issue. In June, Heyns's predecessor, Philip Alston, called for a halt to CIA-directed drone strikes on al-Qaeda and Taliban suspects in Afghanistan and Pakistan.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/24/AR2010102400035.html

[boppers]

1. The 1600's called.

Apparently we stopped using swords and clubs a bit back, and have moved on to weapons that don't involve direct contact between the person attacking, and the person being attacked.

Hint: Musket and cannon balls don't have little men inside of them, nor do the arrows that came before them,

[kas125]

3. Evidently, they don't have involve making sure the targets they

kill are actually the persons we're supposed to be attacking and not innocent civilians at a wedding party or a family gathering, either.

[boppers]

4. Yup, an arrow/bullet/missile isn't smart enough to "know" a target.

As a species, we've made great strides in the accuracy, and lethality, of our weapons.

We have not made similar great strides in the morality of our weapons.


edit: tyop

[slackmaster]

6. Neither does a heat-seeking missile

Or a landmine.

[global1]

2. These Drones Remind Me Of The Nazis V2 Rockets Of WW II......nt

[LawnKorn]

5. If the ethics of weapons was the true issue here, motorized underwater torpedoes would be examined

The use of motorized underwater torpedoes has been a tactic of unrestricted submarine warfare in both WWI and WWII. There has been no significant debate on the use of these 'robots'.

[howard112211]

7. Well, those weapons certainly are of an unpreceded cowardness.

Virtually anyone in history who posessed a form of "warrior's code of honor" would have looked at an army that employs such weapons with disgust.

[earcandle]

8. As was dropping the bomb on Hiroshima... disgusting.

[defendandprotect]

10. True -- and so many of these issues we've never faced --

[defendandprotect]

9. Weren't Nazi Germany "rockets" the equivalent of drones .... ???

War is too profitable and that's long been true --

and life is cheapened by it -- reducing us all to "collateral damage" --

[earcandle]

11. Yea.. I could never and still can't figure out how and why we allow war as an income producing

venture. It hurts everyone and only enriches those who run the guns.

Why do we do it?

World of Grownups-The Slits

[defendandprotect]

12. Think because ONLY you and Brig. Gen. Darlington Smedley Butler ... and me ....

ask those questions ....

We need our President and Congress to be asking that question!!

:)