President Barack Obama
briefly spoke Thursday morning, expressing condolences to the families of two western hostages accidentally killed in drone strikes against suspected terrorists in January.
Obama said he took full responsibility for the operation and apologized to the families of the hostages. "I profoundly regret what happened," he said.
The two Western hostages—one American, one Italian—were killed during a drone strike this year that targeted members of al-Qaeda, the White House said.
The counterterrorism operation happened in January along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and U.S. forces did not know that the hostages were present, administration officials said.
Dr. Warren Weinstein, an American, had been held by Al Qaeda since 2011 and Italian Giovanni Lo Porto was captured in 2012. Obama has ordered a review of the accidental killings. In a separate briefing, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that the drone strike was "lawful and conducted consistent with our counterterrorism policies," though "we are conducting a thorough independent review to understand fully what happened and how we can prevent this type of tragic incident in the future."
7:44 AM PT: The Weinstein family released this statement which reads in part:
“Warren spent his entire life working to benefit people across the globe and loved the work that he did to make people’s lives better. In Pakistan, where he was working before he was abducted, he loved and respected the Pakistani people and their culture. He learned to speak Urdu and did everything he could to show his utmost and profound respect for the region.
“We cannot even begin to express the pain our family is going through and we ask for the respect of our privacy as we go through this devastating ordeal.”