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The boy, 16, sitting with me in these photos was protesting against deadly US drone strikes... Three days later he was killed by a US drone, says Jemima Khan
The attentive, unassuming young man sitting near me in the pictures on the right is Tariq Aziz.
He was 16 when we met last October, just a year older than my own teenage son, although with his neatly trimmed beard and traditional shalwar kameez he looked more like the grown men alongside him.
Tariq had travelled many hours to the relative safety of Islamabad from his home in Waziristan, a rugged Pakistani tribal area on the border with Afghanistan.
He was there to join a protest about the plague of American drones the remote-controlled aircraft that have left a bloody trail of death and fury among the innocent villagers who struggle to earn a living in the unforgiving mountainous region.
I was there to distribute digital cameras so that the people from Waziristan could record the damage and death caused by the drones, as part of a campaign to prove that innocent civilians are dying.
Tariq, a keen amateur photographer, was given one of the cameras before he left to return home.
Three days later he was dead. Like his cousin, who had died in April 2010 and whose identity card he clutched when we met, he was blown to pieces by a drone strike. The appalling irony of how his young life ended will stay with me for ever.
Tariqs homeland is remote, tribal, fiercely traditional and proud that it never succumbed to British rule. The last time I went there was in 1997, accompanied by my then husband Imran Khan, shortly after our wedding, and by my father, James Goldsmith.
The tribal elder who was hosting our visit greeted my father with the words: Welcome. The last Englishman that came to these parts was 100 years ago, and my great-grandfather shot him.
Few people other than locals ever travel into the rugged interior. Frequent checkpoints keep journalists and foreigners out. Mobile phones have stopped working since the mobile network was switched off. There is no industry and little farm land.
Most supplies are driven in by colourfully painted trucks, one of the few jobs available. People live as they have for centuries, following old traditions and tribal codes. Blood feuds are common and every man is armed.
Today, though, a weapon more fearsome than the automatic rifle threatens life in Waziristan the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), or drone, operated by the US, supposedly an ally. The drones are remotely controlled from the Nevada Desert thousands of miles away.
They started flying, infrequently at first, over the northern mountains almost eight years ago. Initially they circled in the skies streaming video back to their operators agents working for the US Central Intelligence Agency. They were gathering information about alleged Al Qaeda members hiding in the cut-off lands.
Now these unmanned planes, launched from secret bases in Pakistan, have become a deadly presence in the Tribal Areas, striking on average once every four days.
They circle over villages and roads for hours, before firing Hellfire missiles. As many as 3,000 people have been killed, though little more than a few lines ever appear in the Western press.
FULL STORY:
Read more: The boy sitting with me in these photos was protesting against deadly US drone strikes... Three days later he was killed ¿ by a US drone, says Jemima Khan | Mail Online
The attentive, unassuming young man sitting near me in the pictures on the right is Tariq Aziz.
He was 16 when we met last October, just a year older than my own teenage son, although with his neatly trimmed beard and traditional shalwar kameez he looked more like the grown men alongside him.
Tariq had travelled many hours to the relative safety of Islamabad from his home in Waziristan, a rugged Pakistani tribal area on the border with Afghanistan.
He was there to join a protest about the plague of American drones the remote-controlled aircraft that have left a bloody trail of death and fury among the innocent villagers who struggle to earn a living in the unforgiving mountainous region.
I was there to distribute digital cameras so that the people from Waziristan could record the damage and death caused by the drones, as part of a campaign to prove that innocent civilians are dying.
Tariq, a keen amateur photographer, was given one of the cameras before he left to return home.
Three days later he was dead. Like his cousin, who had died in April 2010 and whose identity card he clutched when we met, he was blown to pieces by a drone strike. The appalling irony of how his young life ended will stay with me for ever.
Tariqs homeland is remote, tribal, fiercely traditional and proud that it never succumbed to British rule. The last time I went there was in 1997, accompanied by my then husband Imran Khan, shortly after our wedding, and by my father, James Goldsmith.
The tribal elder who was hosting our visit greeted my father with the words: Welcome. The last Englishman that came to these parts was 100 years ago, and my great-grandfather shot him.
Few people other than locals ever travel into the rugged interior. Frequent checkpoints keep journalists and foreigners out. Mobile phones have stopped working since the mobile network was switched off. There is no industry and little farm land.
Most supplies are driven in by colourfully painted trucks, one of the few jobs available. People live as they have for centuries, following old traditions and tribal codes. Blood feuds are common and every man is armed.
Today, though, a weapon more fearsome than the automatic rifle threatens life in Waziristan the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), or drone, operated by the US, supposedly an ally. The drones are remotely controlled from the Nevada Desert thousands of miles away.
They started flying, infrequently at first, over the northern mountains almost eight years ago. Initially they circled in the skies streaming video back to their operators agents working for the US Central Intelligence Agency. They were gathering information about alleged Al Qaeda members hiding in the cut-off lands.
Now these unmanned planes, launched from secret bases in Pakistan, have become a deadly presence in the Tribal Areas, striking on average once every four days.
They circle over villages and roads for hours, before firing Hellfire missiles. As many as 3,000 people have been killed, though little more than a few lines ever appear in the Western press.
FULL STORY:
Read more: The boy sitting with me in these photos was protesting against deadly US drone strikes... Three days later he was killed ¿ by a US drone, says Jemima Khan | Mail Online
