Deputy National Security Adviser John Brennan testifies before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on his nomination to be the Director of the CIA, on Capitol Hill in Washington, February 7, 2013.

WASHINGTON | Fri Feb 15, 2013 6:59pm EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's pick for CIA director, John Brennan, promised senators who will vote on his nomination more openness about U.S. counter-terrorism programs, saying the closely guarded number of civilian casualties from drone strikes should be made public, according to his written responses to questions released on Friday.

Brennan was questioned sharply by Democrats and Republicans alike during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on his nomination last week.

Along with harsh interrogation techniques, Brennan was questioned about drone strikes against terrorism suspects in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and elsewhere. These strikes have increased under Obama and included the killing in Yemen of a U.S.-born cleric suspected of ties to al Qaeda and his U.S.-born son.

The U.S. government, without releasing numbers, has sought to portray civilian deaths from these strikes as minimal. But other organizations which collect data on these attacks put the number of civilians killed in the hundreds.

"I believe that, to the extent that U.S. national security interests can be protected, the U.S. government should make public the overall numbers of civilian deaths resulting from U.S. strikes targeting al Qaeda," Brennan wrote in response to a question from Senator Dianne Feinstein, the committee chairwoman.

"In those rare instances in which civilians have been killed" reviews are conducted and, if appropriate, condolence payments are provided to the families, he wrote.

Such casualties from drone strikes have created profound anger among civilian populations overseas and severe tension between the United States and Pakistan and Afghanistan.

During last week's hearing, Feinstein said she had been trying to speak publicly about the "very low number of civilian casualties" and to verify that number each year has "typically been in the single digits." However, she said she was told she could not divulge the actual numbers because they were classified.

The New America Foundation said the number of civilians killed by U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan was 261-305 from 2004 to 2013. (here).

A former intelligence official said the reason for the discrepancy between the U.S. government's apparently lower figures on civilian deaths and those collected by other organizations may be due to what is counted as a civilian death.

The government assumes "military-aged" males in the proximity of a drone strike are combatants unless it finds out otherwise, the former official said.

Asked whether the government could carry out drone strikes inside the United States, Brennan replied: "This administration has not carried out drone strikes inside the United States and has no intention of doing so."

U.S. legal authorities have not limited the geographic scope to a war zone for using force against al Qaeda and its affiliates, he noted, adding: "This does not mean, however, that we use military force whenever or wherever we want."

YEMEN LEAK PROBE

On another topic, Brennan said he had been advised by the Justice Department that he is a witness in, and not a target of, a criminal investigation into media leaks last year about the disruption of an underwear bomb plot by al Qaeda's affiliate in Yemen. He said he had spoken to investigators, but been advised they have no plans to speak with him again.

Brennan said the Justice Department had provided his lawyer with a transcript of a conference call about the plot which he held last May 7 with former counter-terrorism officials who serve as TV news analysts.

At his confirmation hearing, Brennan confirmed the accuracy of a report by Reuters that during the conference call, he told the pundits that the alleged plot was never a real threat because the U.S. had "inside control" over it. But he vigorously disputed that he had leaked classified information.

Within hours, one of the analysts on the call appeared on TV saying that the U.S. government was implying that it had "somebody on the inside" of the alleged plot "who wasn't going to let it happen." News reports then proliferated saying the U.S. or its allies had succeeded in planting an informant inside al Qaeda's Yemen branch.

Brennan said in his written responses that he had given a transcript of his conference call with the pundits to the committee. Congressional officials said the Obama administration had requested that it be kept confidential, even though Brennan testified that nothing he told the pundits was classified.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for a copy of the transcript.

The committee's vote on Brennan's nomination has been delayed until after a congressional recess next week.

(Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball. Editing by Warren Strobel and Christopher Wilson)

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The facade of the New York Times building is seen in New York, November 29, 2010.

NEW YORK | Wed Jan 2, 2013 5:18pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A federal judge on Wednesday rejected The New York Times' bid to force the U.S. government to disclose more information about its targeted killing of people it believes have ties to terrorism, including American citizens.

U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in Manhattan said the Obama administration did not violate the law by refusing the Times' request for the legal justifications for targeted killings, a strategy the Times said was first contemplated by the Bush administration soon after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

McMahon appeared reluctant to rule as she did, noting in her decision that disclosure could help the public understand the "vast and seemingly ever-growing exercise in which we have been engaged for well over a decade, at great cost in lives, treasure, and (at least in the minds of some) personal liberty."

Nonetheless, she said the government was not obligated to turn over materials the Times had sought under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), even though it had such materials in its possession.

"The Alice-in-Wonderland nature of this pronouncement is not lost on me," McMahon said in her 68-page decision.

The newspaper and two reporters, Charlie Savage and Scott Shane, had sued the government for details about the government's drone program, including the late 2011 killings of U.S. citizens Anwar al-Awlaki and his 16-year-old son Abdulrahman in separate strikes in Yemen.

Civil liberties groups have attacked the drone program, which deploys pilotless aircraft, as in effect a green light for the government to kill Americans without constitutionally required due process. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has rejected that contention.

Among the materials sought by the Times was a memorandum that the newspaper had in early October 2011 reported had been prepared by the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel. The Times cited people who had read the document.

The Times said this memorandum had authorized the "legal targeting" of Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born Muslim cleric who joined al Qaeda's Yemen affiliate and directed many attacks.

APPEAL PLANNED

The Times said it plans to appeal McMahon's decision.

"We began this litigation because we believed our readers deserved to know more about the U.S. government's legal position on the use of targeted killings against persons having ties to terrorism, including U.S. citizens," New York Times assistant general counsel David McCraw said in a statement.

He said McMahon, despite ruling for the government, explained "eloquently ... why in a democracy the government should be addressing those questions openly and fully."

McMahon also rejected information requests in a parallel lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union. That group said it will appeal, and also has a lawsuit seeking information about targeted killings pending at the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

"The public has a right to know more about the circumstances in which the government believes it can lawfully kill people, including U.S. citizens, who are far from any battlefield and have never been charged with a crime," Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director of the ACLU, said in a statement.

Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Justice, said that agency is reviewing the decision.

PROGRAM ON "TIGHT LEASH"

Citing protections envisioned by the Constitution's framers, McMahon said there were "legitimate reasons, historical and legal" to question whether the administration could unilaterally authorize killings taking place outside a "hot" field of battle.

But she rejected the Times' argument that the administration could not rely on exemptions from having to disclose classified or privileged material by virtue of having made at least two dozen public statements about the targeted killing program.

Among these were Obama's statements in an online forum on January 30, 2012, that the government was "judicious" in its use of drones, and that the program was "kept on a very tight leash."

She also cited a speech on March 5, 2012, at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago where Holder said the government could lawfully use lethal force in a foreign country against U.S. citizens who had senior operational roles in al-Qaeda and were "actively engaged" in efforts to kill Americans.

McMahon dismissed the entire case except for one small issue related to two unclassified memos.

The cases are New York Times Co et al v. U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 11-09336; and American Civil Liberties Union et al v. U.S. Department of Justice in the same court, No. 12-00794.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel and Jennifer Saba in New York; Editing by Gary Hill, Bernard Orr)

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IKANINI, South Africa | Sun Oct 7, 2012 8:42am EDT

IKANINI, South Africa (Reuters) - The rules of the game in South Africa's labour market have changed and the new players are workers such as Tshepo Modise and Thulani Soko, wildcat strikers at mining giant Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) (AMSJ.J).

They feel underpaid, stretched to the limit financially and betrayed by established unions they say are more concerned about ties with politicians and management than workers in the shafts.

But to a few global mining firms, they are part of an overpaid workforce breaking their contracts and in the crosshairs for sacking as costs are cut at marginal shafts in South Africa.

"We no longer want to sit at the table with unions. We've been sabotaged," said Modise, a 30-year-old machine operator at Ikanini, a slum settlement next to an Amplats mine 120 kilometers (75 miles) northwest of Johannesburg.

Since the end of apartheid in 1994, workers have won steady wage increases, but millions of jobless South Africans have missed out on the gains, becoming reliant on the state or relatives for help.

Income inequality in South Africa, already among the world's highest, has grown worse since the former liberation movement African National Congress took over after the end of white-minority rule.

Modise and his 33-year-old colleague Soko speak bitterly about living conditions in Ikanini, where there is no running water or electricity, compared with the prosperity of mine managers who live nearby.

The unrest has also led to job losses; Amplats on Friday sacked 12,000 wildcat strikers, and the next day Atlatsa Resources (ATL.V) dismissed some of the 2,500 workers who went on strike this week at its Bokoni platinum mine.

Each miner supports on average eight to 10 people, often living in abject poverty, according to industry data, so the sackings could cut off income to more than 100,000 people.

Strikers said at the weekend they would stay off the job to press the mining giant Amplats to take the workers back.

The head of the National Union of Mineworkers warned of renewed violence. The labour strife has already led to the death of 49 people since August, including 34 shot dead by police at Lonmin's Marikana platinum on August 16 - the worst security incident in ANC rule.

HELD FOR RANSOM

In terms of lost working days, the strikes this year are relatively mild, but the unrest is by far the most violent since the end of apartheid.

In 2011, 6.2 million working days were lost to strikes. The number so far this year is less than 2 million working days, according to the Andrew Levy Employment, a labour consultancy.

President Jacob Zuma's ruling ANC and its governing alliance partner, the COSATU labour federation, have kept a lid on strikes by pushing deals for incremental wage raises, thereby guaranteeing a steady labour supply.

The strikes are now beyond the control of the government and COSATU, as fed-up workers hold out for big pay rises, in some cases double or triple their salaries.

In one of the largest blows to the ANC-COSATU labour alliance forged in the struggle to end apartheid, wildcat strikers at Lonmin's Marikana mine reached a deal in September for yearly wage increases as high as 22 percent.

Within hours, workers at nearby platinum mines called for similar deals. In the days that followed, wildcat strikes hit sectors including gold, iron and car manufacturing.

"Marikana is the future of labour relations in South Africa," said Loane Sharp, a labour economist at staffing firm Adcorp.

"The labour strikes are so much more damaging and dangerous, but they still do not seem to be enough for government to learn the lesson that the labour market is in a shambles," he said.

JOB LOSSES

The strikes pushed the rand to 3-1/2 year lows last week and prompted Moody's last month to cut South Africa's government bond rating, citing the government's difficulty in keeping up with economic challenges and widening strikes.

"The South African government has not implemented the kinds of policies to deal with these structural pressures. They are boiling over to the loss of legitimacy for the main, post-apartheid institutions, including the unions and the ANC," said Mark Rosenberg, an Africa analyst at Eurasia Group.

To appease its allies in COSATU, whose 2 million members have been a powerful vote-gathering machine, the ANC has passed a raft of union-friendly labour laws that economists said have eroded competitiveness and driven up costs for employers.

As a result, South Africa ranks worst among 144 countries in terms of employer-labour relations and next to worst in terms of overpaying unproductive workers, according to the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report.

Nor is anything likely to change this year, with ANC leaders more preoccupied with an internal leadership election at the end of the year than the labour strife, which JP Morgan said is likely to put a dent in 2012 growth.

"South Africa is experiencing a perfect storm as weakening domestic demand coincides with large drags from strikes in mining, downward momentum in manufacturing and political news flow ahead of ANC elections at year-end," it said in a research note.

(Writing by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Will Waterman)

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