Pakistani PM Calls BS on Claim of Al Qaeda Casualties in Predator Strike

The U.S. propaganda story that came out last week to justify the ill-fated Predator strike in Pakistan was ridiculed on Sunday by that nation's Prime Minister as "bizarre."

U.S. officials orchestrated a disinformation program claiming that "four to eight senior Al Qaeda leaders" were killed in the January 13 CIA attack. The questionable assertion was made to try to quiet world outrage over the approximately 13 to 18 civilians that were killed in the small Pakistani border village of Damadola.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said "There is no evidence, as of half an hour ago, that there were any other people there."

"The area does see movement of people from across the border. But we have not found one body or one shred of evidence that these people were there."

Aziz said Sunday, "If you just reflect on what happened, first -- we heard that there was a dinner meeting with all the seniors -- I think that's a bizarre thought, because these people don't get together for dinner in a terrain or environment like that.

"Second, we heard that al-Zawahiri was there," Aziz said. "Now we are hearing about this person who's a chemicals weapons expert. We don't know who was there. We don't know when they came, if at all. But, if they were there, we will find out because our people are investigating, they are going through all the evidence available, and once we find out we'll share it with the world."

Aziz also disputed a report in Sunday editions of The New York Times that said al Qaeda supporters, foreign fighters and Taliban remnants control the remote region.

About 80,000 Pakistani troops in the area have captured around 600 al Qaeda members there, including senior leaders, Aziz said. "The reason we've done that is because this is a porous border. It's a very tough terrain. And we want to restrict movement of people who are undesirable to our security."

Aziz said none of the forces searching for bin Laden knows where he might be. "We and the rest of the world has no clue where he or his associates are," Aziz said. "He could be anywhere."

Today's Washington Post carries two articles relating to this topic. One, an AP account of Aziz's words, conveniently omits the Prime Minister's doubt about any actual Al Qaeda involvement at Damadola.

Nice.

The other piece discusses the failed strike's damage to the wider "War on Terror."

As a matter of fact, this article repeats the propaganda about terrorists at Damadola:

The missiles killed at least 13 others. After the attack, local officials said that only villagers were killed, among them women and children, who were buried nearby. But Pakistani intelligence sources have since asserted, without offering proof, that a handful of foreign al Qaeda militants also died, possibly including its chief explosives expert, a son-in-law of Zawahiri and an operational leader in Pakistan and Afghanistan...

Events along the ever-volatile Afghanistan-Pakistan border this month have exposed deep fault lines in the anti-terrorism alliance among the United States, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and officials on all sides say their joint efforts against militants in the region are now highly precarious.

The heightened tension comes as militant extremists and the United States have both become more aggressive in their tactics, with the Pakistani government caught in between...

Meanwhile, along the border, tensions continue to rise.

"We have a lot of grief in our hearts," said Abdul Hakim Jan, an Afghan tribal leader who helped organize a protest beside a border crossing Wednesday following the deadliest suicide bombing in Afghanistan in the four years since the fall of Taliban rule. "All the terrorists and the enemies of Afghanistan are because of Pakistan. They are receiving their training there and they are being sent to Afghanistan for attacks."

Pakistani tribal leaders, for their part, look a few miles west for the source of their troubles: the American military presence in Afghanistan. Throughout the past week and continuing Sunday, tens of thousands of Pakistanis have participated in boisterous rallies at which protesters burned effigies of President Bush, chanted "Long live Osama!" and denounced the Pakistani government for cooperating with the United States.

"People are so angry that this could become a major movement against the American slaves who are ruling Pakistan these days," said Liaquat Baluch, a leader of Jamaat-e-Islami, the country's largest Islamic party.

As usual, American foreign policy analysts know the truth of the matter:

U.S. officials, however, say Pakistan's objections amount to posturing. According to American military and intelligence sources who spoke on condition of anonymity, Pakistan had signed off on this month's strike beforehand and had even assisted with gathering pre-attack intelligence.


I don't doubt that some lackey of the United States was down with the plan.

This doesn't mean the will of the people was respected.

But, U.S. officials have little respect for the will of the American people. Why should anyone think we care about the feelings of freedom hatin' Muslims?