Pakistan rejects CIA deal on drone campaign

Pakistan rejected US media reports that the country has struck a deal with the CIA over a secret drone campaign in the tribal regions. The New York Times has reported that Pakistan and the United States had signed the deal in 2004 and a US spy aircraft in its first strike had killed senior Pakistani Taliban commander Nek Muhammad in South Waziristan, Xinhua reported. The CIA has since conducted hundreds of drone strikes in Pakistan that have killed thousands of people, Pakistanis and Arabs, militants and civilians alike, the paper said. The Pakistan Foreign Ministry spokesman said that the story is baseless and a part of the propaganda to create confusion about the clear position of Pakistan on this matter. "We have repeatedly affirmed that Pakistan regards the use of drone strikes as counterproductive," the spokesman said while responding to a query regarding a story published in New York Times on an alleged deal on drones. "It (drone strikes) violates Pakistan's sovereignty and it violates International Law," the spokesman said in a statement. He said in a statement that there is now a growing debate in the international community to consider the legality and legitimacy of drone strikes. The New York report claimed that Pakistan's intelligence agency ISI and the CIA agreed that all drone flights in Pakistan would operate under the CIA's covert action authority -- meaning that the United States would never acknowledge the missile strikes and that Pakistan would either take credit for the individual killings or remain silent.