Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif becomes the first premier of Pakistan to openly condemn United States’ prolonged CIA drone war in the tribal areas along the Afghan border. Initiated by George Bush in 2004, the use of unmanned aerial vehicles against militants within Pakistan as well as Yemen, Afghanistan and Somalia increased aggressively under Obama’s regime.
The strikes operated by the Special Activities Divisions of CIA have garnered strong criticism throughout the world mainly due to the reckless disregard for human life.
The protest lodged by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif came as reassurance and support for those under the relentless onslaught of strikes in the tribal agencies as he clearly specified that there was no written agreement on drone strikes in Pakistan. Echoing Pakistan's legal stand, Premier Sharif termed drone strikes as a “violation of the sovereignty of Pakistan” and said that the issue would be taken up within the United Nations. In June, Deputy Ambassador Richard Hoagland was summoned to the Foreign Office after two drone strikes killed seven people in North Waziristan. Differentiating between the legal and illegal implementation of drones, Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon himself maintained that drone strikes remained a conflicted subject under international humanitarian law, often facing justified criticism for the collateral damage caused by them. During his two-day visit in Islamabad, he addressed the government’s qualms with the strikes and acknowledged the quagmire created by American drone policy.
To reinforce the nation’s disdain for the Obama administration’s substantially escalated drone strikes, the Parliament passed a unanimous resolution condemning the strikes while also concluding the policy as counterproductive to bilateral relations between the United States and Pakistan. Before, and now during, Sharif’s premiership, the collective Pakistani sentiment toward casualties caused by drone strikes has been one of collective outrage, but, anti-drone opinion despite the veneer of a more serious protest, is still just a hollow protest and unlikely to see a change in policy anytime soon.
Although the PM's is a worthy stand against America’s disingenuous narrative concerning the use of drones in Pakistan.
With thousands of civilians killed and injured in these strikes, weddings attacked, rescuers struck and schools blown to smithereens, America’s drone policy ultimately sows more hostility, fear and revenge within the country.