Hearts, Minds and Dollars: Condolence Payments in the Drone Strike Age
The U.S. drone war remains cloaked in secrecy, and as a result, questions swirl around it. Who exactly can be targeted? When can a U.S. citizen be killed?
Another, perhaps less frequently asked question: What happens when innocent civilians are killed in drone strikes?
In February, during his confirmation process, CIA director John Brennan offered an unusually straightforward explanation: “Where possible, we also work with local governments to gather facts, and, if appropriate, provide condolence payments to families of those killed.”
There’s little documentation of where and how such payments are being made. The government has released almost no information on civilian casualties sustained in drone strikes conducted by the CIA and the military in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Officials maintain they have been “in the single digits” in recent years, while independent researchers put the total for the past decade in the hundreds.
http://www.propublica.org/article/hearts-minds-and-dollars-condolence-payments-in-the-drone-strike-age
