U.S Drones Kill 38 Somali civilians

[LifetimeStudent]

At least 38 people have been killed after US remote-controlled drones launched aerial attacks in central Somalia near the border with Ethiopia, Press TV reported.


Witnesses told Press TV that the unmanned aerial vehicles fired several missiles at Qeydar and Marodile villages, which are situated between Guriceel and Balanbale districts in Somalia's central region of Galguduud.

Somali tribal elders said that more than 74 people were also injured in the strikes.

Earlier in the day, 20 people were killed and 60 others were injured after a US drone struck the outskirts of Kismayo, a strategically important port city on Somalia's Indian Ocean coast located some 500 kilometers (310 miles) south of the Somali capital Mogadishu.

Somalia is the sixth country where the United States has used remote-controlled drone aircraft to launch deadly missile strikes.

On October 28, the United States admitted to flying unmanned aerial vehicles from Ethiopia.

"The US has unarmed and unmanned aircraft at a facility there (Ethiopia) to be used only for surveillance as part of a broad, sustained integrated campaign to counter terrorism," Pentagon spokesman Captain John Kirby said.

The confirmation appeared a day after The Washington Post revealed in a report that the US flies “armed” drones from an airfield in Ethiopia's southern city of Arba Minch.

The US military has also used drones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Iraq, and Yemen.

Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.

Strategically located in the Horn of Africa, Somalia remains one of the countries generating the highest number of refugees and internally displaced persons in the world.

MP/JR

Source: http://www.thenewstribe.com/2011/11/03/ ... rL5VkNyIpk