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© AP PHOTO/ ANJUM NAVEED



Pakistani journalist Karim Khan has sued the US government for the death of his son and brother, claiming that the CIA killed them both in a New Year's Eve drone strike in 2009, in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region.Khan's son, 16-year-old Zahinullah, was a 10th grade student, and Asif Iqbal, his brother, was a local schoolteacher who had a Master's degree in modern languages. Neither had any ties to terrorist groups. "We would show their tyrannous face to the whole world...that's all," Khan told Al Jazeera. "They cannot bring back my brother or my son...but I will fight against them as far as I can."London's Bureau of Investigative Journalism reports that, since 2004, there have been over 400 drone strikes conducted by the CIA, resulting in the deaths of up to 966 civilians, including 207 children. US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper released reports indicating only 116 civilian casualties since 2009.Shahzad Akbar from theand that a combination of sluggish Pakistani courts and an American government unwilling to take responsibility makes these cases hard to register.Khan observed that civilian deaths perpetrated by the US create the same kinds of militants they purport to be fighting.In the past the American government has insisted that it only kills enemy combatants, but in early April US"In the past, there was legitimate criticism that the legal architecture around the use of drone strikes wasn't as precise as it should have been" Obama told reporters. "There's no doubt that civilians were killed that shouldn't have been..The same strike that killed Lo Porto also killed 73-year-old Warren Weinstein, an American aid worker and also a hostage. His family was also compensated, but that amount was not made public."There's always hope," lawyer Jennifer Gibson told the Independent, referencing Khan's attempt to secure an investigation from Pakistani police. "The ultimate aim is for an international arrest warrant to be issued and pursued by Interpol...