New data reveals number of unreported drone strikes
'More than 40 reports of UK strikes...are simply absent from the MoD’s list.'
The Northern Friends Peace Board has highlighted a new database which has revealed a number of unreported drone strikes.
The ‘sortable and searchable’ dataset from Drone Wars lists ‘all known UK air and drone strikes against ISIS in Iraq and Syria since September 2014’. It also exposes ‘a small number of UK drones strikes that occurred in the second half of 2018 that were not reported at the time’.
According to the group, the data, compiled from official sources, of more than 1,650 individual reports, contains vital and comprehensive details that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has not included in the summaries of UK air strikes in Iraq and Syria listed on its website.
According to Drone Wars, ‘perhaps even more importantly, more than 40 reports of UK strikes – including the first four to occur in late September/ early October 2014 – are simply absent from the MoD’s list. In addition, the targeted killing of Reyaad Khan in August 2015, which was a separate, UK intelligence-led, mission and not part of coalition operations against ISIS, is also not included in the MoD’s list.’
The vast majority of Drone Wars entries detail the target, the aircraft used to launch the strike and which munitions were used.
It adds: ‘Intriguingly, there are eight Reaper drone strikes included in the MoD’s summary list for which no details were released at the time of the strikes. All of these occurred in Syria during the second half of 2018 and several have the potential to be possible targeted killings. It is possibly relevant that these unreported strikes occurred in the months following the May 2018 announcement that a UK drone strike in eastern Syria had killed a civilian.’
