In one of the few occasions in which officials from the Pakistani national government have ever admitted to killing civilians in their attacks along the tribal areas, an unnamed official today conceded that this weekend’s Khyber strike had killed up to 71 civilians.
On Sunday when it happened, Pakistani military officials angrily denied local reports of civilian deaths and claimed that everyone killed was a “militant,” part of a group massing to attack a military checkpoint.
Local officials told a different story, however. The Pakistani jets bombed the home of a Pakistani soldier, killing five members of his extended family and leveling the structure. The “massing” of people were locals trying to rescue anyone still trapped in the rubble, and the bulk of the deaths came when the jets returned and bombed the site again.
The latest from the national government seems to confirm what the locals were saying all along, and as the locals insist the village’s families are disproportionately pro-government and many have soldiers in the military, the reason for the attack is perplexing, to say the least. Officials say they have paid out some $125,000 in “compensation” for the killings.
As this story of civilian deaths comes to an unhappy ending, another looms on the horizon. The missile attack against Miramshah late last night, which officials lauded as killing “four suspected militants,” is reported by locals to have actually killed 13 people, all civilians, including two children.
Sad.
No doubt the compensation was in freshly printed Federal Reserve notes. Maybe they should switch to blood-red ink. Might be a more appropriate symbol of what America's money is really buying.
Hey, they are just brown people who don't speak our language. Nothing to see here folks, move along…..
And they throw american citizens in jail for just talking about blowing up police and then blowing up the rescuers when they arrive. First the video from Iraq and now this. Killing people just to encourage more people to come and save them that you can then kill seems to be another wonderful pattern in the atrocities that are becoming part of the american empire's M.O.
Are we sure this was the Pak Airforce and not the US? Or did we just train these guys to look and do like us.
We are creating more terrorism, not beating it. The world is not going to give a damn next time the US is hit with an attack. There won't be any candlight vigils this time. It's just horrible. I live here but I'm not with these horrible people who can't see the truth through their own pride and false patriotism. If I did not have a family, I would go to the middle east to help these poor civilian people who suffer from these occupations. I feel that guilty.
I see s-man and people like him [few they are] as the real people…. And NOT the SLIME that go along with their government as they work their genocide for those that PAY…. Yaa, I was talkin about it today with a friend… He too is skeptical about the official 911 story…. But NO trial, the military with TORTURE POWER tells us that the perps they detained confessed, but even the 911 commission cannot ask any questions of those that the bush team deems the guilty parties..OR those who interrogated them… They ask, no, DEMAND that we take their (the CIA's) Word that what they tell us about 911 is true…. Yaa, but "they" wanna keep those they accuse FAR away from the American adversarial justice system.. Hey, it is NOW those of us that Don't buy the official story that are deemed the crazies… We are supposed to believe that the government, the Bush government is the honest party and those that doubt them are the unbalanced ones…
PAKISTANI ARMY IS MOST BRUTAL IN THE WORLD MOST OF THEM BELONG TO ETHNIC PUNJABIS–THEY ARE ILLITRATE HORDES–CARRIED GENCIDE IN BAGLADESH IN 1971. THEY ARE POOR FIGHTING FORCE- LAST TWO WARS AGAINST INDIA/THEY ARE WORST THAN CHENGIZS HIRDES