Drone Attacks and Suicide Bombings: Reflections on Pakistan’s Victims

Akbar, Muqarrab

doi:10.1057/9781137347114_9

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 13 publications

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“…Anyone from or living in Pakistan would find it difficult to speak of drone bombings without mentioning suicide bombings. The US and its allies have continued to deny the contention that the impunity of drone warfare was directly responsible for radicalizing people in FATA who reacted to the threat from above by becoming suicide bombers, targeting cities across Pakistan for the state’s complicity in the attacks (Akbar, 2015; Bashir and Crews, 2012; Pilkington and MacAskill, 2015). 2 The link between these two acts of violence is crucial as it shows that the bombings cannot only be understood as singular acts, even if we remain at the level of apprehending violence solely through spectacular events that occur within the logic of a linear and causal temporality.…”

Section: Digital Witnessing Through the Modelling Of Worldsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital witnessing and the erasure of the racialized subject

Awan¹

2021

Journal of Visual Culture

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Humanitarian agencies are relying more frequently on remote sensing, satellite imagery and social media to produce accounts of violence. Their analysis aims at creating more compelling narratives for the court of law or of public opinion and has contributed towards a forensic turn, thus complicating the already fraught relationship between the practice of witnessing and political subjects. This article explores how digital witnessing allows us to ‘see’ further and deeper into places that are at a distance from us, whilst at the same time creating the conditions that make certain subjects recede from view. I will discuss these issues in relation to a country I am familiar with and one that has been central to the forensic imagination – Pakistan – although the particular geographies within Pakistan that this imagination works with are not mine. Thinking with non-linear temporalities of violence, I explore how the forensic turn may have actually contributed to the erasure of the racialized political subject.

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Section: Digital Witnessing Through the Modelling Of Worldsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital witnessing and the erasure of the racialized subject

Awan¹

2021

Journal of Visual Culture

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United States’ Unlawful Drone Strikes and Damages Caused to Humanity: A Case Study of Pakistan

Imran

Nordin

Muhamad

2020

UUM Journal of Legal Studies

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This paper contributes significantly through suggestions to overcome the problem created by the disastrous US drone strikes in Pakistan. This paper evaluates incidences of the United States’ combat drone strikes in Pakistan and the damage caused to innocent people. It seeks to determine possible violations of international laws and the extent to which these strikes diminish the sovereignty of Pakistan. After the incident of 9/11, the use of combat drones in armed conflicts among states, non-state actors, disruptive groups and organisations has increased and expanded. Combat drones are controlled by operators who depend for their primary sources of information on cameras and sensors to determine their targets. Drone strikes lack identification processes causing many innocent people to be killed or injured. Drone strikes launched in non-conflict areas also increase the concerns about illegitimate interference in a state’s territorial sovereignty and violations of international laws. It covers the following questions. What are the basic principles about the use of force? What kinds of damages are caused by US drone strikes in Pakistan that violate basic human rights principles? What are the concerns of international organisations about drone strikes in Pakistan? Summarily, it covers the United States unlawful drone strikes in Pakistan and damages caused to humanity. The paper uses doctrinal qualitative analysis to situate the research within the ethical, legal and social parameters of the related statutes of international law. The research methodology adopted is evaluative, interpretive and analytical. The paper consists of 8 segments: (1) drones and the United States armed forces, (2) some basic international law principles about the use of force, (3) possible human rights violations, (4) US drone strikes diminish the sovereignty of Pakistan, (5) demands for transparency, (6) the damages caused to humanity by the drone strikes, (7) concerns of international organisations about illegitimate drone strikes causing extra judicial killings and (8) some recommendations to regulate the use of combat drones. It demonstrates that international law does not regulate the use of combat drones in armed conflict and no considerable effort has been made to bring the use of combat drones under the rule of law. Furthermore, US drone strikes in Pakistan’s territory have been done without consensus, resulting in the violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and the killing of innocent people.

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Drone Attacks and Suicide Bombings: Reflections on Pakistan’s Victims

Cited by 2 publications

References 13 publications

Digital witnessing and the erasure of the racialized subject

Digital witnessing and the erasure of the racialized subject

United States’ Unlawful Drone Strikes and Damages Caused to Humanity: A Case Study of Pakistan

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