Where's the body? Villagers say that all of the victims were family members and residents: US air strike kills 18 tribesmen
MOHMAND AGENCY (Online): As many as eighteen persons have been killed and six fatally injured due to bombardment by the allied aircraft from Afghanistan on Friday. The fourteen fatalities have been confirmed by ISPR, as briefed by Maj Gen. Shaukat Sultan. The bombardment by the Allied forces, fell on Damadola Burkanday area of tehsil Mamoon in Bajaur agency at 3:00 am PST, completely flattening the homes of BakhtPur, Muhammad Rahim and Bacha Khan.
According to local eyewitnesses, fourteen members of BakhtPur family along with four others died, due to indiscriminate bombing. The dead included eight children, and four females. The dead included, 9-year old Nadia Bibi, 10-year old Sadiqa, 9-year old Tayyeb, 7 year old Zahid ullah, 5-year old Hussain Nawaz. Others included 20-year-old Ameer Muhammad, 25-year-old Nazir Muhammad, 50-year Noor Pari, 40-year old Shahi Badan, 30-year-old Qari Saeed, 30-year-old Tahira Bibi, and others. Some of the dead were unidentified. A touring journalist the site of bombings informed the BBC that the dead had been buried. It is feared that the dead could well exceed 18. In the past about eight persons had died due to such bombings and the government had lodged strong protests to the American Administration. NNI adds: A lawmaker from Bajur tribal region said on Friday that an American spy plane fired missiles on the houses of three locals, killing 18 civilians, including women and children. “A US spy plane had been flying in Bajur region for three days. The plane did such flight early morning and bombed three houses of locals in Damadola village, 50 kilometers away from the Pak-Afghan border,”
Member National Assembly from Bajur tribal region Sahibzada Haroon ur Rashid said on phone from Bajur. Damadola is around 200 km northwest of the capital, Islamabad. Haroon ur Rashid said the plane first threw light and then made a circle around the target and fired eight missiles on the houses of three local tribesmen. A total of 18 people were killed in the attack carried out at 3 a.m., he said. Four other people, including two children, were injured and they are stated to be in critical condition. Rashid said that no al-Qaeda member or foreigner citizen among those died. “It is inhuman act to kill civilians under the excuse of foreign militants,” he said. “The government should officially condemn U.S attack,” said Haroon ur Rashid, who belongs to the alliance of Islamic groups, Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal. He said a big protest rally will be held in Bajur on Saturday to condemn the American bombing. Announcements were made in the area through loud speakers to attend the rally. All those died were later buried and thousands attended the funeral, witnesses said, who attended the funeral. Shah Zaman, brother of Bakht Pur, whose family died in the bombing, condemned the attack and said innocent people were killed. “We are innocent but do not know as to why were we targeted,” Shah Zaman told reporter after the funeral. “Why our family was subjected to cruel bombing and why our houses were destroyed,” he said. A local correspondent in the area Dr Noor Hakim, who visited the site, said on phone that those killed include eight children and four women.
Correspondents said that hundreds of people from other areas thronged to the bombing site and were angry at the attack. People in the nearby areas said that those died were running jewelry shops in Khar, the center of Bajur tribal agency. Locals said this is the first incident of its kind of U.S attack. Military spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan and Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed have said that several people have died in explosions and that investigation into the causes of the incident is being carried out. The Bajur attack happened few days after Pakistan lodged protest with U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan about firing in the North Waziristan tribal area on Saturday night that had killed eight people. Bajur border Afghanistan’s eastern Kunar province, where Taliban and Hekmatyar-led Hizbe-e-Islami are active.
http://frontierpost.com.pk/archives.asp (enter date 17-01-06)
Now we have
reports by govt. and military officials of an 'Al-Qaeda bomb-maker who was allegedly 'killed' in the airstrike.
Why should anyone believe them? Where's the body? Where's the proof. There hasn't been any presented, yet the media, this rag, Matthews on Hardball, and others are repeating this dodge to cover the killing of innocent civilians in the Pakistani town by their predator drone's hellfire missiles.
One report says there are empty graves, another says the bodies were supposedly spirited away by their compatriots, another says some shadowy, unidentified subjects removed some bodies for identification. If that's so, then where's the proof? They had no problem putting the bullet ridden bodies of Saddam's sons on display for the world. They obviously have no evidence, and their word is crap. Our bungling authorities in charge of the drones, likely the CIA, are responsible for the deaths of these men, women, and children. Their mindless video game operators manuevered these unmanned, remote controlled planes into the sovereign nation of Pakistan. They had the area under watch for days. They knew who was in the town, women, children . . . Their superior's lies won't be enough to cover up the wanton, deliberate violence unleashed on this town of innocents.
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