U.S. drone strike kills 12 in Pakistan

AP GraphicsBank

(AP) QUETTA, Pakistan - A U.S. drone strike killed 12 suspected militants in northwest Pakistan near the Afghan border Friday. In the southwest, gunmen on motorcycles opened fire at a roadside restaurant.

Watch: Examining the latest out of Pakistan, Syria, and Iran

U.S. drones fired a total of five missiles at a compound in Miran Shah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal area, according to Pakistani intelligence officials speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. In addition to the militants killed, six others were wounded, some of them critically, they said.

Those hit were believed to loyal to Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a militant commander whose forces frequently target U.S. and other NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan, the officials said. A similar drone attack Sunday killed eight of Bahadur's fighters.

U.S. officials rarely speak publicly about the covert CIA drone program in Pakistan.

The strikes are extremely unpopular in Pakistan because many believe they mostly kill civilians, a claim disputed by the U.S. Pakistani officials regularly denounce the attacks of violations of the country's sovereignty, but the government has cooperated with at least some of the strikes in the past.

That cooperation has come under strain as the relationship between the two countries has deteriorated. Pakistan's parliament has demanded the U.S. end the strikes, but Washington has made clear that isn't going to happen.

The drones were a complication in U.S. efforts to get Pakistan to end its seven-month blockade of NATO troop supplies that run through the country to Afghanistan. Pakistan closed the route in retaliation for American airstrikes that killed 24 Pakistani troops in November. Islamabad reopened the supply line this week after the Obama administration said it was sorry for the deaths.

Friday's drone strikes were the first since the route reopened.

The people killed in the restaurant attack that occured later in the day in the remote town of Turbat in Baluchistan province were Pakistanis travelling with smugglers to Europe through neighboring Iran, said Abdul Razzaq, a government official in the area. Two people were also wounded, he said.

It's unclear what motivated the attack. Baluchistan regularly experiences violence from both Islamist militants and nationalists who demand a greater share of the province's natural resources.

[K. Daraa]

Time to crate up those drones along with whatever expensive military gear is worth the cost of recovering, and getting ALL US forces out of Afghanistan and away from the longest-costliest revenge/punishment operation in our history. It wouldn't have been, if the US government hadn't "morphed" the mission of revenge-punishment for 911 to "nation-building" after early-Spring 2002. Along with that nation-building mission has come a price tag of 3,000 plus Americans killed-in-action, with tens of thousand wounded, and several $trillions of our national treasure. All this commitment and cost lining the pockets of criminals and international defense contracting companies, was mostly decided by proxy, without the say-so of the American voting public. The thought of giving a backwards group of kleptocrats our national blessing as a "favoured non-NATO ally of the US" is revolting at best, and immoral and degrading to our country. The thought of giving the Pakistanis, who consider the American public their number one enemy, anything other than a clear view of our hind sides makes many of us particularly sick - like eating rotten road k-ill.

[Jame_Gum]

Making the world a better place, one Islamic extremist at a time!

[Rynedrop]

killing in Allah/God's name. Look where this has gotten the human race --> just more sophisticated weapons. Nothing has been solved. When will we learn to get along? When will we learn the true meaning of love?

[JamesSao]

Thank you Joe Biden for tirelessly fighting for this program that built on the Bush years development of drones. But your boss still sucks. Sorry Joe...