Group: Syrian missiles kill at least 141 in Aleppo

Related Photos

This citizen journalism image taken on Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2013, and provided by Aleppo Media Center AMC, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows a Syrian man carrying a girl's body in the aftermath of a strike by Syrian government, in the neighborhood of Jabal Bedro, in Aleppo, Syria. (AP Photo/Aleppo Media Center AMC)

Discussion

February 26, 2013

Group: Syrian missiles kill at least 141 in Aleppo

By Barbara Surk Associated Press Tue Feb 26, 2013, 04:01 PM CST

BEIRUT — At least 141 people, half of them children, were killed when the Syrian military fired at least four missiles into the northern province of Aleppo last week, Human Rights Watch said Tuesday.

The international rights group said the strikes hit residential areas and called them an “escalation of unlawful attacks against Syria’s civilian population.” The statement from the New York-based group followed a visit to the area by a HRW researcher.

Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, has been the scene of some of the heaviest fighting of the civil war pitting President Bashar Assad’s regime against rebels bent on ousting him.

Rebels quickly seized several neighborhoods in an offensive on the city in July, but the government still controls some districts and the battle has developed into a bloody stalemate, with heavy street fighting that has ruined neighborhoods and forced thousands to flee.

A Human Rights Watch researcher who visited Aleppo last week to inspect the targeted sites, said up to 20 buildings were destroyed in each area hit by a missile. There were no signs of any military targets in the residential districts, located in rebel-held parts of Aleppo and its northern countryside, said Ole Solvang, the HRW’s researcher.

“Just when you think things can’t get any worse, the Syrian government finds ways to escalate its killing tactics,” Solvang said.

Human rights watch said 71 children were among the 141 people killed in the four missile strikes on three opposition-controlled neighborhoods in eastern Aleppo. It listed the names of the targeted neighborhoods as Jabal Badro, Tariq al-Bab and Ard al-Hamra. The fourth strike documented by the group was in Tel Rifat, north of Aleppo.

“The extent of the damage from a single strike, the lack of (military) aircraft in the area at the time, and reports of ballistic missiles being launched from a military base near Damascus overwhelmingly suggest that government forces struck these areas with ballistic missiles,” the report said.

Syrian anti-regime activists first reported the attacks last week, saying they involved ground-to-ground missiles, and killed dozens of people. The reports could not be independently confirmed because Syrian authorities severely restrict access to media.

Human Rights Watch said it compiled a list of those killed in the missile strikes from cemetery burial records, interviews with relatives and neighbors, and information from the Aleppo Media Center and the Violations Documentation Center, a network of local activists.

The rebels control large swaths of land in northeastern Syria. In recent weeks, Assad’s regime has lost control of several sites with key infrastructure in that part of the country, including a hydroelectric dam, a major oil field and two army bases along the road linking Aleppo with the airport to its east.

A key focus for the rebels in the Aleppo area is to capture the city’s international airport, which the opposition fighters have been attacking for weeks.

Opposition forces have also been hitting the heart of Damascus with occasional mortars shells or bombings, posing a stiff challenge to the regime in its seat of power.

U.S. and NATO officials have previously said that Syria has a significant ballistic missile capability and is believed to have a few hundred missiles with a range of some 700 kilometers (440 miles) that could hit targets deep inside Turkey, a NATO member and one of the harshest critics of the Assad regime.

NATO has in recent weeks deployed Patriot missile systems along Turkey’s border with Syria.

The missile attacks have outraged the leaders of the exiled opposition who have accused their Western backers of indifference to the suffering of the Syrian people.

Text Only

State, national, world

Okla. senator opposes federal fracking rules
The Obama Administration is arguing for the rules because the Bureau of Land Management's current regulations for fracking are more than 30 years old.

May 17, 2013 1 Photo
Oklahoma Senate unveils $80 million plan for 2 new museums
A new plan diverts $80 million in state sales and use taxes over a four-year period to pay for the completion of an American Indian museum in Oklahoma City and build a new popular culture museum in Tulsa.

May 16, 2013 1 Photo 2 Stories
Candice Glover wins 12th season of 'American Idol'
Glover looked stunned when "Idol" host Ryan Seacrest announced she bested soulful 22-year-old country singer Kree Harrison from Woodville, Texas.

May 16, 2013 2 Photos
Mom chases down child abductor, rams his car; man arrested
The family called 911 and the mother jumped into her vehicle and gave chase for about seven miles, unaware the man had pushed the girl out of the silver Buick before fleeing the apartment complex, authorities said. The girl was found wandering nearby, uninjured, police said.

May 16, 2013 2 Photos
Texas tornado devastation includes Habitat homes
The weather service said the preliminary storm estimate for the Granbury tornado was an EF-4, based on the Fujita tornado damage scale. An EF-5 is the most severe.

May 16, 2013 3 Photos 1 Story
Brothers arrested in Mother's Day parade shooting
The arrests by city police and U.S. marshals came less than four days after gunfire scattered the crowd and wounded 20 people — 19 hit by bullets and one while trying to flee.

May 16, 2013 2 Photos 1 Story
At least 6 dead in Texas tornado outbreak
"We were all, like, hugging in the bathtub and that's when it started happening. I heard glass shattering and I knew my house was going. We looked up and ... the whole ceiling was gone." -- Elizabeth Tovar

Click the Headline Story Link to see VIDEO of tornado

May 16, 2013 4 Photos
Black Friday illegal in Oklahoma? Say it isn't so ...
A recent attorney general's opinion confirmed that Black Friday and other low-price sales events are illegal, even if they are temporary. Find out what the Legislature is doing to fix it.

May 15, 2013 1 Photo 3 Stories
1 trial for man in deaths of Oklahoma girls, woman
Kevin Sweat, 27, will be tried in January for the death of his girlfriend, Ashley Taylor, as well as the shooting deaths three years earlier of 13-year-old Taylor Placker and 11-year-old Skyla Whitaker.

May 15, 2013 2 Photos 2 Stories
Wisconsin wildfire consumes 8,700 acres
No injuries have been reported in the largest forest fire to hit northern Wisconsin in 33 years, according to the DNR.

May 15, 2013 1 Photo
More State, national, world Headlines

State, national, world

Search Results

Related Photos

Discussion

Group: Syrian missiles kill at least 141 in Aleppo

Site Map

Contact Us