The following is from the National, the UAE's paper of record. There is lots more about the fallen CIA officers in the same article, but it is being repeated all over the wires today and this part isn't getting quite the same play so I am going to hilight it as a result:

In 2009, 44 predator strikes carried out by the CIA in the tribal areas of Pakistan struck only five of their intended al Qa'eda and Taliban targets, but more than 700 innocent civilians also died, according to Pakistani authorities. A senior Taliban commander said a suicide bomb attack that killed seven CIA operatives in Afghanistan last week was an act of retaliation against the US drone attacks.

Pakistan's Dawn newspaper reported: "According to the statistics compiled by Pakistani authorities, the Afghanistan-based US drones killed 708 people in 44 predator attacks targeting the tribal areas between January 1 and December 31, 2009.

"For each al Qa'eda and Taliban terrorist killed by US drones, 140 innocent Pakistanis also had to die. Over 90 per cent of those killed in the deadly missile strikes were civilians, claim authorities."