In Pakistan, Giant Portrait Puts Face on Drone Strikes

  • In this undated handout photograph, a poster bearing the image of a Pakistani girl whose parents, lawyers say, were killed in a drone strike, lies in a field at an undisclosed location in the northwestern Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.
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By Richard Conway

A group of artists in northwest Pakistan have installed a huge skyward-facing poster of a young child in a field to help raise awareness for the many victims of drone attacks in the region. The image shows a Pakistani girl whose parents, lawyers say, were killed in a drone strike.

Unveiled two weeks ago in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region, the work was made with the help of French street artist JR, and is titled #NotABugSplat — a reference to the term “bug splat” used in U.S. military parlance to refer to victims of drone attacks.

Since 2004, Pakistan’s tribal districts on the border with Afghanistan — which are home to Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants — have been subject to numerous drone attacks. According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, these strikes have killed at least 2,296 people and 416 civilians.

Richard Conway is Reporter/Producer for TIME LightBox. Follow him on twitter @RichardJConway

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