Pakistani victims of US drone attack to appear before Congress, despite setbacks
A Pakistani school teacher and his children will be the first drone victims to testify before Congress on Tuesday, October 29. Their lawyer, however, has been prevented from entering the US.
Last October, Rafiq ur Rehman was out visiting his sister when a
drone missile struck near his home, killing his mother, Momina
Bibi, 67, and injuring his three children.
Rehman, a primary school teacher in North Waziristan, will speak
to Congress about his experience on Tuesday, as will two of his
children: Nabeela, age 9, and Zubair, age 13.
“I have no idea why my grandmother was killed. When the drone
hit, I was outside with my grandmother. Everything became dark, I
was scared, so I started to run. Then I noticed my hand was
bleeding, so I tried to clean my hand, but blood kept coming out.
But I was very scared, so I just kept running,” the killed
woman’s granddaughter Nabeela told RT’s Gayane Chichakyan.
“My mother was killed, my children were injured. I’m so glad
that people are going to hear our story. That’s why we came to
America. We have no idea why my village and our house was
targeted,” the woman’s son Rehman said to RT.
The Rehmans were invited to the United States by Rep. Alan
Grayson (D-Fla.), who said it’s important to hear from those
living under the eye of the country’s controversial drone
program.
“When it comes to national security matters like drone strikes,
it’s important that we hear not only from the proponents of these
attacks, but also from the victims,” Grayson said in a statement.
“They have a unique perspective to share with Congress, and I
hope that my colleagues will attend this important event.”
Originally, the Congressional briefing was scheduled for last
month, but the State Department declined to issue a visa to the
Rehmans’ attorney, Shahzad Ahkbar.
"It's not like my name is scratched because there is some sort of confusion. My name is blocked!" Akbar told the Guardian in September.
"Before I started drone investigations I never had an issue with US visas. In fact, I had a US diplomatic visa for two years."
According to Akbar, his travel restrictions prevented him from speaking at a human rights conference in Washington last April, and most recently he was also absent at a "Life Under Drones," part of a drones conference at New York University.
Despite Akbar’s absence, with Rep. Grayson’s help the Rehman
family was able to secure travel arrangements for the October 29
meeting.
The briefing comes only a few days after a Washington Post report
revealed that Pakistan’s government officials secretly approved
of U.S. drone strikes in the country despite public condemnations
to the contrary.
The Rehmans, however, would like to get some answers during their
visit to the U.S. The family says it still has no clue why Momina
Bibi was targeted and killed in her garden last year. In the
account given to the Guardian, Nabeela said she was picking okra
in the garden with her grandmother when she suddenly heard a loud
noise
"I was scared,” she said. “I noticed that my hand
was hurting, that there was something that had hit my hand and so
I just started running. When I was running I noticed that there
was blood coming out of my hand."
"I had seen my grandmother right before it had happened but I
couldn't see her after. It was just really dark but I could hear
[a] scream when it had hit her."
Nabeela and Zubair were both rushed to the hospital, but by the
time their father made it home the remains of Momina Bibi had
already been buried.
The first reports concerning the incident claimed that up to four
militants were killed in the strike, but Amnesty International
Researcher Mustafa Qadri noted the many red flags that were
raised by the various accounts.
“We got all sorts of different stories to begin with,"
Qadri said to the Guardian. "One was that [Bibi] was
preparing a meal for some militants and that's why she was
killed. Another one was that there was a militant on a motorbike,
right next to her. And then there's this story of, that there was
a militant in a jeep, SUV, with a satellite phone, at the exact
point that she's killed, but 10 minutes earlier. He used the
phone and then he drives off into the distance. And then the
drones come later and they kill her. So we found that that just
really did not add up."
Qadri also found that the missile directly and physically struck
Momina Bibi, suggesting that she was specifically targeted. The
lack of answers, and the unwillingness of the U.S. government to
clarify the situation, simply casts even more doubt on the drone
program, Qadri claimed.
"That secrecy, the unaccountability, the lack of lawfulness
to it, is the key problem," he said. "In the context of
Pakistan and just in the very micro sense, I don't think drones
alone are the problem. It's the way they're used and it's the way
they're used in isolation, ignoring the broader factors in that
region."
Regardless of what the number is or isn’t, Rehman wants to take
his opportunity to tell the American people what it’s like living
with drones, and that the program is causing real damage.
"I want them to know the drones are having an impact on our
lives,” he said. "It's hitting our elders. It took my
mom. It's effected my children and we haven't done anything
wrong."
For its part, the Obama administration says it has an official
tally on civilian casualties as a result of drone strikes, but it
refuses to share the number for national security reasons. It
claims the count is significantly lower than the numbers floating
around in public (ranging anywhere between dozens to hundreds of
deaths).
Brian Becker, an anti-war activist, told RT that while congressional leaders have yet to devote any energy into finding a meaningful way to curb drone activity, it is up to them to stop what Becker says has become an inherently criminal program.
“What we see with this shocking case of a 67-year-old grandmother in her garden with her grandchildren is the direct targeted victim of the drone attack. In other words the missile hit her directly, blew her apart and then a second attack against her surviving family members when they came to the scene,” he said. “If nothing shocks the conscience of the Congress like this then nothing ever will.
“We see that this is a criminal action by the US government,” Becker continued. “The drone pilots who carried out the direct, violent death of this 67-year-old grandmother, they should be arrested and so should their superiors.”