'US drone strikes on Pakistani territory must stop: Army chief General Raheel Sharif.

'US drone strikes on Pakistani territory must stop: Army chief General Raheel Sharif. (ET).

Army chief General Raheel Sharif on Wednesday said US drone strikes on Pakistani territory are regrettable and must stop as they are a threat to the sovereignty and security of the country, Express News reported.

“US drone strikes in Pakistani territory are regrettable and must stop,” said General Raheel while speaking to the media after President Mamnoon Hussain’s address to the joint session of Parliament.

General Raheel Sharif was present at the session marking the start of the new parliamentary year along with the navy and air force chiefs.

Earlier, the army chief warned the recent US drone strike targeting late Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour was detrimental to bilateral relations between the two countries. The army chief’s reaction came during a meeting with the Ambassador of US David Hale at the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, a statement issued by Inter Services Public relations (ISPR) said.

While expressing serious concerns over the drone strike, COAS said such acts of sovereignty violations are detrimental to relations between both countries and are counter-productive for ongoing peace process for regional stability. Read the full story here.

"Survival of the Fittest" Drone-spotting: Survival guide informs on new breed of aerial predators.

"Survival of the Fittest" Drone-spotting: Survival guide informs on new breed of aerial predators.(RT).

In light of the growing number of drones, the Guide advises a number of techniques to evade and scramble drones. The document is available online and has been translated into 17 different languages.

“Our ancestors could spot natural predators from far by their silhouettes. Are we equally aware of the predators in the present-day?” writes the Guide.

It contains the silhouettes and measurements of all of the most widely-used drones, from the ‘Killer Bee’ to ‘The Sentinel’ as well as information on where they are currently operational. It goes on to detail ways you can hide from a drone.

“Most drones are equipped with night vision, and/or infrared vision cameras, so-called FLIR sensors. These can see human heat signatures from far away, day or night. However there are ways to hide from drones.”

Among the tactics it advices for eluding the aerial craft are: hiding “in thick forests,” wearing space blankets to confuse heat sensors, not using wireless communication, and the use of mannequins or human-sized dolls as decoys.

“Wait for bad weather. Drones cannot operate in high winds, smoke, rainstorms or heavy weather conditions.”


As well as avoidance strategies to escape from the craft, the document also gives advice on how to hack into a drone’s systems. The Guide gives the assurance that as long as a drone’s communications are not encrypted then they can be hacked. It describes how to intercept and interfere with the workings of a drone and also details a process called “spoofing”.

“Small, portable GPS transmitters can send fake GPS signals and disrupt the Drones navigation systems. This can be used, for example, to steer drones into self-destruction flight paths or even hijack them and land them on a runway.”Read the full story here.

Analyst: Drone strikes are a violation of international law and constitute the supreme war crime under the Nuremberg principles.

Analyst: Drone strikes are a violation of international law and constitute the supreme war crime under the Nuremberg principles.(PressTv).

A US political commentator says CIA assassination drone strikes are a violation of international law and constitute the supreme war crime under the Nuremberg principles.

Dr. Kevin Barrett, who is one of the renowned US critics of Washington’s so-called war on terror, made the remarks in an interview with Press TV on Friday, a day after a United Nations report warned that the use of armed drones threatens global security and encourages more states to acquire unmanned weapons.

“These drone strikes are clearly examples of the supreme war crime under the Nuremberg principles, which is the crime of aggression. Attacking another country, that is in any situation other than to stop an imminent attack on one’s own country, is aggression, the supreme war crime,” Barrett said.

“So every single drone strike is an example of this supreme war crime, and I think this UN report is an example of too little too late. They are not coming out and calling it what it is — the supreme war crime. They are simply claiming it is a misguided example of so-called global policing.

“But if some anti-American group would start using drones to blow up wedding parties in the US, it would be called terrorism and these people would be internationally considered outlaws.

“So the Americans who are using this cowardly means of slaughtering innocent civilians all over the world are terrorists and outlaws as well.”

The veteran commentator also said, “I do not think the UN is going to be able to stop these drone attackers from doing their evil deeds. I think it will probably happen gradually as the US Empire slowly loses its power.”

The UN report, which has been submitted to the UN General Assembly by Christof Heyns — the organization’s special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, summary or arbitrary executions — called for states that operate armed drones to be more transparent and publicly disclose how they use them.

“The expansive use of armed drones by the first states to acquire them, if not challenged, can do structural damage to the cornerstones of international security and set precedents that undermine the protection of life across the globe in the longer term,” the report said.

“The use of drones by states to exercise essentially a global policing function to counter potential threats presents a danger to the protection of life, because the tools of domestic policing (such as capture) are not available, and the more permissive targeting framework of the laws of war is often used instead,” it pointed out.

The report also called for international laws to be respected rather than ignored.

“The view that mere past involvement in planning attacks is sufficient to render an individual targetable, even where there is no evidence of a specific and immediate attack, distorts the requirements established in international human rights law,” stated the report.

Countries cannot consent “to the violation of their obligations under international humanitarian law or international human rights law,” it added.

The report noted that “drones come from the sky but leave the heavy footprint of war on the communities they target.”

“The claims that drones are more precise in targeting cannot be accepted uncritically, not least because terms such as ‘terrorist’ or ‘militant’ are sometimes used to describe people who are in truth protected civilians,” it said.

The report is the first of two major papers on drone strikes due to be debated at the UN General Assembly on October 25.

The second, by Ben Emmerson, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, was published on Friday.

The investigation found that US drone strikes have killed more than 450 civilians in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen over the past decade.

Emmerson said that drone strikes have killed far more civilians than US officials have publicly acknowledged.
He said on Thursday that at least 400 in Pakistan and as many as 58 in Yemen have been killed by the CIA drone strikes, and censured the US for failing to aid the investigation by disclosing its own figures.


Washington uses assassination drones in several countries, claiming that they target “terrorists”. According to witnesses, however, the attacks have mostly led to massive civilian casualties.

Related: RT – Drones - National Debate Coaches Association (PDF).

1. Jeff, Research Analyst at the Institute for the Study of War. .... Under international law, in order for the U.S. government to legally target civilian terror ... including by a non-state actor, would constitute an “armed attack” under Article 51. ...... US drone policies violate UN Basic Principles

Video - Customs and Border Patrol agency has considered equipping its fleet of domestic Predators with “non-lethal” weapons.

Video - Customs and Border Patrol agency has considered equipping its fleet of domestic Predators with “non-lethal” weapons. HT: Slate.

The expansion of drones into domestic airspace continues to raise unresolved privacy and civil liberties questions, particularly as military-style drones like the Predator are capable of flying beyond sight at high altitude, carrying powerful cameras that can zoom in and covertly monitor the ground below. Recently disclosed documents have compounded these concerns, revealing that the Customs and Border Patrol agency has considered equipping its fleet of domestic Predators with “non-lethal” weapons and eavesdropping equipment to pick up phone calls on the ground below. (The FBI did not disclose in its letter to Paul whether it uses large military-style drones like the Predator, or smaller, commercially available drones like the Octocopter.)Read the full story here.

Bill Would Ban Drone Strikes Against U.S. Citizens.

Bill Would Ban Drone Strikes Against U.S. Citizens.(HP).

There’s one measure that quietly passed in the House along with Friday’s massive defense bill that libertarians may like: a ban on drone strikes against U.S. citizens.

The idea that the United States military could target citizens with Hellfire missiles from an unmanned aerial vehicle caught prominence when Sen. Rand Paul held an epic 13-hour filibuster demanding to know whether the Obama administration thought it had the authority to carry out such a strike.

Attorney General Eric Holder eventually answered “no,” the administration does not, as long as the person is not actively engaged in combat against the United States.

Still, many members of Congress did not want to take Holder at his word, and a ban, authored by Georgia GOP Rep. Paul Broun, was slipped into the National Defense Authorization Act among a block of amendments approved only on a voice vote.

The amendment says the “Department of Defense may not use a drone to kill a citizen of the United States,” except in the same case Holder noted.

“The prohibition … shall not apply to an individual who is actively engaged in combat against the United States.”

“I reluctantly supported the NDAA because it is critical that we provide for our national defense and give our men and women in uniform the resources they need,” said Broun. “However, I am deeply concerned that the bill doesn’t go far enough to protect U.S. citizens from government overreach, and I plan to continue to work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to ensure that Americans’ rights are protected.” The Senate is now working on its own version of the bill.Read the full story here.

DHS built domestic surveillance tech into Predator drones.

DHS built domestic surveillance tech into Predator drones.(CNet).The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has customized its Predator drones, originally built for overseas military operations, to carry out at-home surveillance tasks that have civil libertarians worried: identifying civilians carrying guns and tracking their cell phones, government documents show.
The documents provide more details about the surveillance capabilities of the department’s unmanned Predator B drones, which are primarily used to patrol the United States’ northern and southern borders but have been pressed into service on behalf of a growing number of law enforcement agencies including the FBI, the Secret Service, the Texas Rangers, and local police.
Homeland Security’s specifications for its drones, built by San Diego-based General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, say they “shall be capable of identifying a standing human being at night as likely armed or not,” meaning carrying a shotgun or rifle. They also specify “signals interception” technology that can capture communications in the frequency ranges used by mobile phones, and “direction finding” technology that can identify the locations of mobile devices or two-way radios.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center obtained a partially redacted copy of Homeland Security’s requirements for its drone fleet through the Freedom of Information Act and published it this week. CNET unearthed an unredacted copy of the requirements that provides additional information about the aircraft’s surveillance capabilities.

Concern about domestic use of drones is growing, with federal legislation introduced last month that would establish legal safeguards, in addition to parallel efforts underway from state and local lawmakers. The Federal Aviation Administration recently said that it will "address privacy-related data collection" by drones.
The prospect of identifying armed Americans concerns Second Amendment advocates, who say that technology billed as securing the United States' land and maritime borders should not be used domestically. Michael Kostelnik, the Homeland Security official who created the program, told Congress that the drone fleet would be available to "respond to emergency missions across the country," and a Predator drone was dispatched to the tiny town of Lakota, N.D., to aid local police in a dispute that began with reimbursement for feeding six cows. The defendant, arrested with the help of Predator surveillance, lost a preliminary bid to dismiss the charges.
"I am very concerned that this technology will be used against law-abiding American firearms owners," says Alan Gottlieb, founder and executive vice president of the Second Amendment Foundation. "This could violate Fourth Amendment rights as well as Second Amendment rights."Read the full story here.

DOJ white paper explaining Obama's targeted killing program - Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of Al Qa’ida or An Associated Force.

DOJ white paper explaining Obama's targeted killing program - Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of Al Qa’ida or An Associated Force.HT: BarracudaBrigade.

Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of Al Q... by Mike Riggs

Homeland Security Quietly Runs “Loan-a-Drone” Program for Local Law Enforcement.

Homeland Security Quietly Runs “Loan-a-Drone” Program for Local Law Enforcement.(AllGov).By Noel Brinkerhoff .Government watchdog groups are concerned that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been loaning out sophisticated, expensive drones to local law enforcement, and in the process turning the military’s hottest new weapon on Americans.
In one of the first known instances of domestic drone use, in 2011 DHS loaned one of its unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to police in North Dakota in order to spy on a farmer, Thomas Brossart, who had refused to give back some cows that had wandered onto his property. The Brossart case was the first known drone-aided arrest.
The Washington Guardian reports that since then, DHS and Customs and Border Protection (CPB) have deployed drones several other times to help local law enforcement and other federal agencies.
The problem with the loan-a-drone program, according to critics, is that it is being operated on an ad-hoc basis with no established regulations for how and when to use them, or how to protect Americans’ privacy, or how to make sure taxpayers are reimbursed for the loaners.
After all, CPB’s drones can cost between $15 million and $34 million each to purchase, not to mention their hourly operational costs.
Between loan-a-drone and DHS giving out $4 million in grants to help police buy their own drones, good government groups are concerned that homeland security is subsidizing the militarization of local police forces.
“Drones are a powerful surveillance tool that can be used to gather extensive data about you and your activities,” Jennifer Lynch, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which studies privacy issues, told the Washington Guardian. “The public needs to know more about how and why these Predator drones are being used to watch U.S. citizens.”Read the full story here.

Related: White House wins fight to keep drone killings of Americans secret

Why is SOCOM Lying About Domestic Drone Activities?

Why is SOCOM Lying About Domestic Drone Activities?(PIN).Via : Cryptogon.A spokesman for U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) has provided statements to publications in New Hampshire and Oregon indicating that information regarding domestic drone activities provided by Public Intelligence is inaccurate, despite confirmations from the offices of two U.S. Senators. Following our publication last week of a map of current and proposed Department of Defense drone activities within the U.S., several journalists with local publications around the country wrote articles regarding drone activities that were listed in their area. David Brooks of the Nashua Telegraph wrote about the listing of New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington as the site of a USSOCOM drone activity involving small unmanned aerial vehicles including the Raven and Wasp. Corey Pein of the Willamette Week wrote about a planned USSOCOM drone activity in Portland that was listed as utilizing the same types of drones.
When each of these reporters contacted USSOCOM for information on the drone activities in their area, a spokesman stated that the information provided in our map, which was constructed from several public U.S. Air Force presentations from 2010 and 2011, was incorrect. The spokesman, deputy public affairs officer Ken McGraw, went so far as to tell the Willamette Week that “U.S. Special Operations Command does not have nor will it have [a drone] base in Portland.”
McGraw provided the Nashua Telegraph with a nearly identical statement that USSOCOM “does not have a [drone] base in Mt. Washington” and added that “US Special Operations Command does not issue the Raven or Wasp. Those two UAVs are Army pieces of equipment.”

Both of the statements provided by USSOCOM have now been found to be demonstrably false following further investigation of public documents and confirmations of drone activities from the offices of two U.S. Senators.

In New Hampshire, a local newspaper has now confirmed with the office of Senator Kelly Ayotte that in 2010, Navy Special Operations Forces utilized areas around Mt. Washington to conduct training operations using Wasp and Raven drones. David Brooks of the Nashua Telegraph was further able to confirm via Army Lt. Col. James Gregory that similar exercises were also conducted in 2009 using the same types of drones.
In Oregon, the Willamette Week was able to confirm with the office of Sen. Ron Wyden that drones are currently stored in Portland for several military units in the area. Though the location is not primarily used as a launch site, the spokesman for Sen. Wyden’s office stated that “in the event of a natural disaster or other legitimate need” drones could be flown out of Portland.
In each of the statements provided by USSOCOM, their involvement in domestic drone activities is denied or misrepresented, preventing any meaningful exchange from taking place. If the military wishes to counter controversy from the increasing integration of drones into domestic airspace, then it may help to not make statements to press that are inaccurate or disproved by publicly available congressional reports.Hmmm......It slowly starts to resemble a 'Terminator' movie.Read the full story here.

Pentagon Lists 110 Potential Drone Bases in U.S.

Pentagon Lists 110 Potential Drone Bases in U.S.(SN).The Department of Defense has identified 110 sites in the United States that could serve as bases for military unmanned aerial systems (UAS), or drones. A new report to Congress lists each of the 110 sites “and the UAS likely to fly at that location.” See “Report to Congress on Future Unmanned Aircraft Systems Training, Operations, and Sustainability,” Department of Defense, April 2012 (pp. 9-12).
The newly disclosed DoD report was first reported by InsideDefense.com.
The actual or potential drone bases are located in 39 of the 50 states, from Fort McClellan in Alabama to Camp Guernsey in Wyoming, as well as Guam and Puerto Rico.
Currently, the DoD and the military have “88 active certificates of authorization (COAs) at various locations around the country” that permit them to fly UASs outside of restricted military zones, the report to Congress said. COAs are issued by the Federal Aviation Administration.
But “The rapid increase in fielded UAS has created a strong demand for access within the NAS [National Airspace System] and international airspace. The demand for airspace to test new systems and train UAS operators has quickly exceeded the current airspace available for these activities,” the report said.
The Senate Armed Services Committee, evidently receptive to this demand, said in its report on the FY2013 defense authorization act that integration of drones into domestic airspace should be accelerated. See “Senate: Drones Need to Operate ‘Freely and Routinely’ in U.S.,” Secrecy News, June 8, 2012.
The website Public Intelligence previously identified 64 U.S. drone site locations.
See also “Revealed: 64 Drone Bases on American Soil” by Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai, Wired Danger Room, June 13:
“UAS will not achieve their full potential military utility unless they can go where manned aircraft go with the same freedom of navigation, responsiveness, and flexibility,” the new DoD report to Congress said.
A bill “to protect individual privacy against unwarranted governmental intrusion through the use of the unmanned aerial vehicles” (HR 5925) was introduced in the House of Representatives on June 7 by Rep. Austin Scott. A companion bill (S.3287) has been introduced in the Senate by Sen. Rand Paul.Hmmmm.........Obama Blames “Founding Fathers” For Making It Difficult For Him To “Bring Change”But......"I will keep plotting".Read the full story here.

Senate: Drones Need to Operate “Freely and Routinely” In U.S.

Senate: Drones Need to Operate “Freely and Routinely” In U.S.(FAS).The integration of drones or unmanned aerial systems (UAS) into the National Airspace System (NAS) needs to be expedited, the Senate Armed Services Committee said in its report on the FY2013 defense authorization bill last week.
“While progress has been made in the last 5 years, the pace of development must be accelerated; greater cross-agency collaboration and resource sharing will contribute to that objective,” the Committee said.
A provision of the bill would encourage greater collaboration on drone integration among the Department of Defense, the Federal Aviation Administration, and NASA.
“Large number of UASs now deployed overseas may be returned to the United States as the conflict in Afghanistan and operations elsewhere wind down in coming years, and new UASs are under development.”
“Without the ability to operate freely and routinely in the NAS, UAS development and training– and ultimately operational capabilities– will be severely impacted,” the Committee report said.
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives yesterday approved an amendment to the 2013 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations bill that would prohibit DHS from acquiring or flying drones that have weapons onboard.
“None of the funds made available by this Act may be used for the purchase, operation, or maintenance of armed unmanned aerial vehicles,” says the provision sponsored by Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ).
This prohibition, which is limited to DHS, is likely to be of no practical significance. “Has there ever been any plan to buy armed drones by Homeland Security?” asked Rep. Norm Dicks on the House floor yesterday. “No,” replied Rep. Robert Aderholt.
Also yesterday, Rep. Scott Austin (R-GA) introduced a bill (HR 5925) “to protect individual privacy against unwarranted governmental intrusion through the use of the unmanned aerial vehicles commonly called drones.”Hmmm...........Read the full story here.