BEIRUT (AP)
-- United Nations experts are investigating allegations that rebels
killed dozens of Syrian soldiers in a village near Aleppo after they
captured it from government troops, an incident that could amount to a
war crime, the world body's human rights chief said Friday.
Navi
Pillay said in a statement that a U.N team in the region is looking
into reports about killings that followed the battle in Khan al-Assal in
July. Pillay said the team has examined activists' videos and collected
accounts from people in Aleppo on an incident that she called "deeply
shocking."
While abuses by troops loyal to
President Bashar Assad have been systematic and widespread throughout
the two-year conflict, human rights groups have said the frequency and
scale of rebel abuses also has increased in recent months. Specific
allegations against opposition fighters include claims that rebels have
routinely killed captured soldiers and suspected regime informers.
Rebels say any such violations are condemned and an unfortunate result of the brutal regime crackdown.
In
a letter to the U.N. Security Council obtained Friday by The Associated
Press, the opposition Syrian National Coalition urged council members
to "take immediate steps to refer the Syrian case to the International
Criminal Court," the world's permanent war crimes tribunal.
"Only
by holding the violators of human rights accountable for their crime
will the violence in Syria end," said the letter dated Aug. 1 and signed
by the coalition's U.N. representative, Najib Ghadbian.
The
letter made no mention of Khan al-Assal, but it "condemns all
atrocities committed by all parties" and reiterates the coalition's
pledge to assist the U.N. commission investigating human rights abuses
in Syria, "including in liberated areas."
The
coalition noted Monday's statement by Paulo Pinheiro, head of the U.N.
commission investigating human rights abuses in Syria, to the U.N.
General Assembly saying "massacres and other unlawful killings are
perpetrated with impunity" - most by pro-government forces and some by
anti-government armed groups.
Opposition
fighters in recent weeks have suffered major setbacks on the
battlefield. Infighting among various armed groups also has plagued
rebel ranks, weakening the opposition's campaign against Assad's rule.
The
capturing of Khan al-Assal on July 21 was a rare success for the
opposition, one overshadowed by activists' claims that rebels had killed
150 government soldiers after taking the village. Some of the soldiers
who were killed had surrendered to the rebels, the Britain-based
Observatory for Human Rights reported.
Syrian state media reported that rebels killed 123 "civilians and military personnel" in Khan al-Assal.
In
a statement issued in Geneva on Friday, Pillay said two of the videos
the U.N. team reviewed apparently show government soldiers being ordered
to lie on the ground, while another shows several bodies scattered
along a wall and a number of bodies at an adjacent site.
Preliminary
findings of the U.N. probe also suggests that armed opposition groups,
in one incident documented by video, executed at least 30 individuals,
the majority of whom appeared to be soldiers, Pillay said.
"These
images, if verified, suggest that executions were committed in Khan
Al-Assal," Pillay said. She called for a "thorough independent
investigation to establish whether war crimes have been committed."
She also warned that opposition forces "should not think they are immune from prosecution."
Syria's
main opposition bloc last week condemned the killings and blamed them
on "armed groups" not affiliated with the Western-backed Syrian National
Coalition. The umbrella group of opposition fighters is known as The
Free Syrian Army. Although rebel groups - including the radical Islamic
ones - share a common goal of toppling Assad, they operate independently
on the battlefield. Islamic factions have been gaining influence and
groups such as the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusra front have led major
battles in the past year.
In a statement last
week, the Nusra Front confirmed its fighters had participated in the
battle for Khan al-Assal. The group has not claimed responsibility for
the soldiers' killings, though it did confirm that 150 soldiers,
pro-government gunmen and Shiite militiamen were killed in Khan
al-Assal.
More than 100,000 people have been
killed since March 2011 when crisis started with largely peaceful
protests against Assad's rule. It turned into civil war after opposition
supporters took up arms to fight a brutal government crackdown on
dissent. Millions have been fled their homes, with some seeking shelter
in more peaceful parts of Syria and more than a million fled into
neighboring countries.
U.N. humanitarian chief
Valerie Amos decried the continuing failure by the government and
opposition to protect civilians across Syria, which she said means
"women, men and children continue to be killed, injured and displaced
across the country. "
"Thousands of people are
trapped in areas besieged by government forces and opposition groups,"
she said in a statement. "Hundreds have reportedly been killed, injured
or taken hostage in attacks in Homs, Aleppo and other areas of Syria in
the last two days alone."
Amos said
humanitarian workers are risking their lives to help but people are
being prevented from getting basic assistance, including food, drinking
water and medical care.
Specifically, in the
central city of Homs, new checkpoints are stopping supplies from
entering the hard-hit area, said Anthony Lake, executive director of
UNICEF. Lake said in a statement that vegetables, milk and other
essentials are in "increasingly short supply" and his own agency's
supplies will run out in days.
"Cannot all
those involved agree that the innocent women and children in Homs, and
across Syria, should be spared all possible suffering?" he asked.
In
the latest cycle of rebel-on-rebel violence, 12 Islamic fighters were
killed in fighting between Kurdish opposition fighters and rebels linked
to al-Qaida, the Observatory said Friday. The clashes took place in the
northeastern Hassakeh province, the Observatory said. It added that the
dead were all members of two al-Qaida linked groups, the Islamic State
of Iraq and the Levant and the Nusra Front.
Rival
rebels groups - mostly Islamic groups and Kurdish gunmen - frequently
have clashed in northern in Syria over control of territory along the
border with Turkey that fighters captured from regime troops over the
past year.
Earlier this week, the infighting
turned into a war within a war after a powerful Kurdish militia called
on its supporters to fight al-Qaida-affiliated groups to avenge the
recent killing of a prominent political leader.
---
Associated Press writer Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.
No comments:
Post a Comment