July saw most drone kills in past 12 months: Report

July was the busiest month since January for the CIA’s drones with three strikes killing at least 23 dead.

The CIA-operated unmanned aerial combat vehicles, commonly referred to as drones, killed more people in Pakistan per missile strike in July, 2013 than at any other point in the past 12 months, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported.

According to the Bureau's tally, the CIA carried out at least three strikes in July, 2013. This was the busiest month since January for CIA’s drones with the strikes claiming at least 23 lives, eight of them identified by name.

This was the highest ratio of people killed in each strike in Pakistan since July, 2012 when four strikes reportedly killed at least 38 people.

The first strike on July 3 skewed the kill ratio – it was the bloodiest attack in nine months with 16-18 people reported dead. This bucked a trend identified by the Bureau for low-casualty strikes since its peak in 2009.

One strike on July 13 reportedly killed two people.

On July 28 a further strike killed at least five people. Three were reportedly al Qaeda training experts. An unnamed Taliban source claimed the three had trained the team that attacked a Pakistani prison on July 29. Reuters named the three alleged trainers as: Abu Rashid, from Saudi Arabia, Muhammed Ilyas Kuwaiti, from Kuwait, and Muhammed Sajid Yamani, from Yemen.

Earlier in July, the Bureau had released an internal Pakistani record of drone strike casualties showing officials found CIA drone strikes have killed a significant number of civilians. Of 746 people listed as killed in the drone strikes outlined in the document, at least 147 of the dead are clearly stated to be civilian victims, 94 of those are said to be children.

All actions 2004 – July 31 2013

Total Obama strikes: 320
Total US strikes since 2004: 371
Total reported killed: 2,514-3,584
Civilians reported killed: 410-928
Children reported killed: 164-195
Total reported injured: 1,112-1,493
For the Bureau’s full Pakistan databases click here.