Source: Press TV
At least 11 people
have been killed after US assassination drones launched aerial attacks
in southern Somalia near the border with Kenya, Press TV reports.
Somali tribal elders, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told
Press TV that the remote-controlled aerial vehicles fired several
missiles at Bilis Qooqaani town, which is located 448 kilometers (278
miles) southwest of the Somali capital Mogadishu, on Thursday morning.
They added that over 50 people were also injured in the strikes.
Somalia is the sixth country where the United States has used assassination drones to launch deadly missile strikes.
The US military has also used drones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Iraq, and Yemen.
On October 28, the United States admitted to flying the terror aircraft from a base in Ethiopia.
"The US has unarmed and unmanned aircraft at a facility there
(Ethiopia) to be used only for surveillance as part of a broad,
sustained integrated campaign to counter terrorism," said Pentagon
spokesman Captain John Kirby.
The confirmation appeared a day after The Washington Post revealed in a report that the US flies “armed” drones from an airfield in Ethiopia's southern city of Arba Minch.
Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.
Strategically located in the Horn of Africa, Somalia remains one of
the countries generating the highest number of refugees and internally
displaced persons in the world.
