美国国务卿克里访问巴基斯坦

Well, John Kerry said that the Drone Strike program will end because quite simply the US is eliminating all of the threats that is soaring in the first place, but he left himself a little bit of leeway, saying that hopefully it will end very soon. That of course giving the US the possibility to continue for some time if they see fit.

We got to remember the timing of this. John Kerry is in Pakistan, trying to lead something of a reset of relations between the two countries. The Drone program is just one of the issues that’s led to so much mistrust and tension over the last couple of years between the two countries because Pakistan sees the Drone programme as a threat to its, a violation of its own sovereignty.

So the US is aware that it has to do something to appease this new government in Pakistan. We’ve already seen that a dramatic decrease in a number of drone strikes taking place, only about 16 this year compared to something like 120 in years gone by. And what John Kerry has said is, in effect, repeating what Barack Obama said in a major speech on drones back in May when he talked about the need for them, but the recognition that they were limited in the capability and need, if you’d like to have better oversight of that programme.

So it doesn’t come as a great surprise that John Kerry is trying to appease some of those they are imparity in Pakistan, trying to smooth these problems in the relationship. But an opinion poll recently found that 74% of Pakistani people felt the US was the enemy. And that shows you just how far the US has got to go if it is to repair this relationship even if you set aside the fact that it is expanding its Drone program in other parts of the world.