US drones have Assad in their sights: Voice of Russia

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Photo: AFP

Syria has become yet another country whose airspace is being used by unmanned US drone planes to collect information about attacks against civilians by President Assad’s forces. There have been no reports as to whether the drones are reporting about opposition movements as well. The Voice of Russia’s Konstantin Garibov sends this report.

The Pentagon makes it no secret that is aims to intercept talks between Syria’s political leadership and its military command. The US is thereby striving to substantiate its claims that the shelling of Syrian cities and attacks on Syrian civilians pursue the purpose of preserving the current regime. This information will then be passed to the UN Security Council in order to toughen sanctions against Syria or even set the stage for foreign intervention. The US keeps assuring the world community that drones over Syria do not testify to military preparations against Damascus. Vladimir Sotnikov of the Institute for Oriental Studies, doubts that.

"It looks like the data supplied by the American drones are passed to British and Qatar special task forces which are deployed in Homs, which has been the scene of fierce clashes between opposition supports and government troops. Drones flying above Syria send clear evidence that western partners are expecting a change of government in Syria at an early date."

US drones caused a big international row in Iraq. Baghdad was angered by US unmanned planes flying over the Iraqi territory without the consent of the local authorities. This airspace is ours, not America’s, Iraq’s Interior Minister Adnan al-Assadi said. His Syrian counterpart could well say the same. Both would be right, given that flying drones above other countries’ territories runs counter to international law.

According to The New York Times, the US is bound to send more drones to countries, such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, in the near future. Meanwhile, the Pentagon and the CIA have been using unmanned aircraft against terrorist groups in Yemen and Somalia. Washington has drone bases in Ethiopia, on the Seychelles and on the Arab Peninsula.

The US has been launching drone planes not only from its military bases. It has also resolved to assign them to US embassies. Reports by the US State Department say that using heavy armed drones like Predator and Reaper are out of the question. These kinds of aircraft penetrate any obstacles for scanning telemetric data. Given that this aircraft costs a startling $899mln, even such a rich country as South Korea which planned to acquire US drones for gathering secret data in the airspace above North Korea and China, had to think better of it.