An independent rights watchdog said that it recorded an upsurge in civilian casualties in Syria in the past three months as the Assad regime and its allies continue to wage ferocious bombing campaigns in different parts of Syria.
In a report issued on Friday, the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) said that Assad regime forces committed at least 40 massacres in eastern Ghouta near Damascus claiming the lives of 729 civilians in the past three months. The victims included 185 children, 109 women, seven civil defense workers, 10 medical workers, and two media activists.
The Network pointed out that Assad’s forces are responsible for the death of 697 civilians, including 177 children, 96 women, six civil defense workers, 10 medical workers, and one media activist.
The Russian forces killed 32 civilians, including eight children, 13 women, and one civil defense workers in three massacres, the monitoring group added.
The Network said that it recorded no fewer than 108 attacks on vital civilian centers by Assad regime forces, including 28 mosques, 10 health facilities, 32 popular markets, 11 schools, three kindergartens, an orphanage, 13 vehicles belonging to the Civil Defense Corps, two Syrian Arab Red Crescent centers, four services centers, a church, an ambulance, a university, and an educational institute.
The report indicated that the attacking forces did not abide by any of the rules of the law of war as they used chemical weapons and deliberately bombed health centers. It noted that bombardment, killings, and destruction have not stopped for a single day over the past 90 days.
According to the report, the Assad regime and Russian forces used cluster munitions in four attacks, poison gas in three attacks, and incendiary weapons in one attack. The Network also said that eight civilians, including two children and a woman, died due to lack of food and medicine resulting from the siege imposed by the Assad regime forces on the Damascus suburb.
Some 400,000 civilians currently live under siege in eastern Ghouta, many of whom have died of hunger and disease, including children and women. The Network recorded an increased in the deaths resulting from illness and hunger due to the severe shortages of food and medical facilities.
Eastern Ghouta has been subjected to relentless onslaught by the Assad regime and the allied Iranian militias backed by Russian aerial support. The attacks have claimed the lives of hundreds of civilians in recent weeks and caused the humanitarian situation to further deteriorate amidst failure of the international community to provide assistance to civilians. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)
