Do we comply with the law?

That's the question the U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Christof Heyns, asks of us.  Heyns and his group have been investigating our drone attacks and have issued a report to the United Nations Human Rights Council. 

The report does not say that we have not complied with the law.  Rather it asks us to clarify what we do to comply.  He cites figures from Pakistan which claim the drones killed at least 957 in 2010 alone.  Heyns also does not state unequivocally that civilians have been killed, he uses "allegedly".  However, it's pretty clear that civilians have been killed.

This is not the first report of this kind.  In 2009 a similar report was published.