Obama Administration Silencing Pakistani Drone-Strike Lawyer

[Better Believe It]

Last edited Mon Apr 9, 2012, 03:03 PM - Edit history (1)

Obama Administration Silencing Pakistani Drone-Strike Lawyer
by Medea Benjamin
April 9, 2012

When is the last time you heard from a civilian victim of the CIA’s secret drone strikes? Sure, most of them can’t speak because they’re deceased. But many leave behind bereaved and angry family members ready to proclaim their innocence and denounce the absence of due process, the lack of accountability, the utter impunity with which the U.S. government decides who will live and die.

But in Pakistan, where most strikes have occurred, the victims do have someone speaking out on their behalf. Shahzad Akbar, a Pakistani lawyer who co-founded the human rights organization Foundation for Fundamental Right, filed the first case in Pakistan on behalf of family members of civilian victims and has become a critical force in litigating and advocating for drone victims.

Akbar is by no means anti-American. He has traveled to the United States in the past, and has even worked for the U.S. government. He was a consultant with the U.S. Agency for International Development, and helped the FBI investigate a terrorism case involving a Pakistani diplomat.

But his relationship with the US government changed in 2010, when he took on the case of Karim Khan, a resident of a small town in North Waziristan who claimed that his 18-year-old son and 35-year-old brother were killed when a CIA-operated drone struck his family home.

Read the full article at:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/04/09-6


Shahzad Akbar (left), a Pakistani lawyer who co-founded the human rights organization Foundation for Fundamental Right, filed the first case in Pakistan on behalf of family members of civilian victims and has become a critical force in litigating and advocating for drone victims. On his right is, Karim Khan, a resident of a small town in North Waziristan who claimed that his 18-year-old son and 35-year-old brother were killed when a CIA-operated drone struck his family home


-------------------------------------------------------------------


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 9, 2012

Pakistani Lawyer Representing Victims of Drone Strikes Prevented From Speaking in U.S.

WASHINGTON - April 9 - Pakistani lawyer Shahzad Akbar has been invited to speak at an International Drone Summit in Washington DC on April 28, but the U.S. government is failing to grant him a visa.

The Summit is organized by the peace group CODEPINK and the legal advocacy organizations Reprieve and the Center for Constitutional Rights. Akbar, co-founder of the Pakistani human rights organization Foundation for Fundamental Rights, is important to the Summit because of his work providing legal aid to victims of CIA-operated drone strikes. Akbar filed the first case in Pakistan on behalf of family members of civilian victims and has been a critical force in litigating and advocating on victims' behalf.

While Akbar has traveled to the United States in the past, he has not been granted permission to return since becoming an outspoken critic of drone attacks in Pakistan that have killed hundreds of civilians. He was previously invited to speak about drone strikes at Columbia University in New York, but he never received a response to the visa application he filed in May 2011. One year later, he is still waiting for a response, and he has been unable to get an answer from the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad as to why his application is being held up.

“Denying a visa to people like me is denying Americans their right to know what the U.S. government and its intelligence community are doing to children, women and other civilians in this part of the world,” Akbar said. “The CIA, which operates the drones in Pakistan, does not want anyone challenging their killing spree. But the American people should have the right to know.”

The CIA’s secret drone program has killed hundreds of people in Pakistan with no due process and no accountability. Akbar represents families whose innocent loved ones have been killed and maimed in these drone attacks.

“Shahzad is the voice for these poor tribal people who have had no recourse,” said CODEPINK co-director Medea Benjamin. “It’s outrageous that our government is trying to keep him from speaking at the Drone Summit.”

“The Obama administration has already launched six times as many drone strikes as the Bush administration in Pakistan alone, killing hundreds of innocent people and devastating families,” said Leili Kashani, Advocacy Program Manager at the Center for Constitutional Rights. “By refusing to grant Shahzad Akbar a visa to speak about this abhorrent reality in the United States, the Obama administration is further silencing discussion about the impact of its targeted killing program on people in Pakistan and around the world.”

The Drone Summit’s organizers vow to keep pressuring the U.S. government to grant Akbar a visa.

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. government has increasingly deployed unmanned drones in the Middle East, South Asia and Africa. While drones were initially primarily used by the U.S. military and CIA for surveillance, these remotely controlled aerial vehicles are currently routinely used to launch missiles against human targets in countries where the United States is not at war, including Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. As many as 3,000 people, including hundreds of civilians and even American citizens, have been killed in such covert missions.

Shahzad Akbar is available for interviews from Pakistan. To arrange an interview, contact Ramah Kudaimi at [email protected] or 708-822-5880.

http://www.codepink4peace.org/article.php?id=6122

So what are they afraid of? BBI

[ProSense]

1. Could it have

something to do with this?

Pakistani sues US over drone strike

Kareem Khan is seeking $500m in compensation from the US government over the death of his son and brother.

A Pakistani man whose son and brother were killed by what he claims was a US drone strike is seeking $500 million in compensation from the US government over the incident.

Kareem Khan said that a CIA-operated drone fired missiles at his house in Pakistan's North Waziristan on New Year's Eve in 2009, killing his son 18-year old son Zaenullah and his brother Asif Iqbal.

In a legal notice to US officials, including the heads of the Pentagon and the CIA, Khan's lawyer has demanded a staggering $500m in compensation.

"We say to them that these drone attacks you are carrying out are killing innocent people," Khan told the Reuters news agency, describing the message he wanted to convey to the Americans.

The US embassy said that no communication had been received over the case. Pakistan's government has repeatedly criticised the strikes, but experts say they could not occur without help from Pakistani authorities.

Khan's lawyer, Shahzad Akhbar, also plans to file a constitutional petition in an effort to force the US to cease the attacks.

- more -

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2010/11/2010113015473706384.html

Certainly would help to have the full story and background on these issues.

[msongs]

3. people perpetrating crimes against humanity prefer to keep things quiet as possible nt

[Comrade Grumpy]

5. I dunno. Should he be barred from the US because he is suing us?

[gratuitous]

2. An updated version of "don't ask, don't tell"?

This is one of the sorriest chapters of the American wehrmacht, considering how many resources are devoted to supporting this unsupportable program.

[SidDithers]

4. pfffftttt....nt

Sid

[demosincebirth]

6. Good. They don't like us anyway.

[Better Believe It]

7. Self-Delete

Deleted