Yemen’s government has paid more than $1 million in compensation to the families of civilians killed in a 2013 U.S. drone attack on a wedding convoy, according to documents released Monday.

Yemen’s tacit admission that civilians were killed contradicts repeated claims by the Obama administration that U.S. strikes spare the innocent. Experts with UK-based charity Reprieve, which obtained documents showing evidence of the compensation, say that the relatively high dollar amount from one of the poorest governments in the region indicates that the U.S. may not only know about the civilian deaths, but could be secretly funding the payouts.

According to Reprieve’s evidence, which was published Monday by the Washington Post, the Yemeni government has promised to pay a total of $1.24 million in compensation for the 12 people killed in the attack, which also wounded at least 24. The documents are records of the compensation payments made to family members of all 12 people killed and bear the signatures of Yemeni court officials.

Reprieve lawyers say it is questionable that the Yemeni government, which received $256 million in U.S. aid in 2013, could have afforded the compensation on its own.

The Department of Defense last year admitted that it has documents relating to compensation for U.S. military wrongs in Yemen but refused a Freedom of Information Act request for their release, according to Reprieve.