BEIRUT, Oct 11: Syrian rebels killed at least 190 civilians and took more than 200 hostage during an offensive in Latakia province in August, Human Rights Watch said today, in what it calls the first evidence of crimes against humanity by opposition forces.
HRW said many of the dead had been executed by militant groups, some linked to al Qaeda, who overran army positions at dawn on Aug. 4 and then moved into 10 villages nearby where members of President Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect lived.
In its first government-sanctioned trip into Syria during the 2-1/2-year conflict, New York-based HRW has documented a series of sectarian mass killings by Assad’s foes during a broader campaign in which Western-backed rebels took part.
In some cases, entire families were executed or gunned down as they fled, according to a report titled “You Can Still See Their Blood”.
HRW identified five rebel groups instrumental to funding, organising, planning and carrying out the Latakia attacks, including the al Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant groups, as well as the Islamist group Ahrar al-Sham and another unit of foreign jihadi fighters.
These groups publicised their involvement through videos and statements, some of which were used to corroborate the HRW report. The operation appeared to have been largely financed by private Gulf-based donors, HRW said.
What is less clear is the role of fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA), the armed wing of the main opposition coalition which is openly supported by the United States, Britain, France and Sunni Muslim Gulf states.
In a video posted on Aug. 11 and apparently filmed in Latakia, FSA chief Salim Idriss said the body was participating in the offensive “to a great extent.”
But HRW researcher Lama Fakih, who spent several days in Latakia province in September and spoke to residents, soldiers, militiamen, doctors and officials, said she could not confirm if the FSA were present on Aug. 4 when the atrocities took place.
Assad’s forces are also accused by rights groups of committing atrocities and using incendiary and cluster bombs in populated areas. They have carried out sectarian attacks, including killing up to 450 civilians in two massacres in mainly Sunni Muslim areas in May, according to U.N. Officials.
The opposition and rights groups accuse Damascus of a chemical weapons strike in a Damascus suburb on Aug. 21 that killed hundreds of civilians. The government blames the attack on rebels.
(AGENCIES)
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