Pak govt. 'red-faced' over Army's drastically-reduced US drone casualty figures

The Pakistan Government has been embarrassed and left 'red-faced' over the disputed, low non-combatant casualty figures on U.S. drone strikes reported by the defence ministry in the Senate on Thursday.

The defence ministry informed the Senate on Thursday that drones had killed 2,160 terrorists, and 67 civilians.

Based on the data provided by the military on drone casualties, the Foreign Office had informed the United Nations special reporter, Ben Emmerson, in March this year that there were 400 confirmed civilian deaths in U.S. drone strikes and another 200 victims were likely non-combatants.

Foreign Office (FO) spokesman Aizaz Chaudhry said the government has got a national consensus against the U.S. drone strikes in its tribal regions and that a strategy is being devised to take up this matter with America bilaterally, as well as raise it at the international forums, Dawn News reports.

Chaudhry said that the government was convinced that pilotless air attacks were counter-productive, and that the FO had sought details from the defence ministry on the low casualty figure quoted in Senate.