Trump: Civilians killed in intelligence ops to go unreported

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is revoking an Obama-era requirement for reporting civilian casualties that result from U.S. intelligence operations across the globe.

Trump issued an executive order Wednesday scrapping a section of former President Barack Obama’s order that required reports of civilian casualties that occurred through military as well as intelligence operations. With Trump’s action, only civilian casualties from military operations will need to be reported.

Steven Aftergood, a government secrecy expert at the private Federation of American Scientists, says the executive order doesn’t say that the administration is no longer requiring reports of civilian casualties resulting from CIA strikes or other intelligence operations, but that is exactly what the Trump administration is doing.