Stalemate in Syria fuelling rise in mass killings says UN chief

Paulo Sergio Pinheiro says the destructive stalemate between president Bashar Assad’s regime and anti-government rebels is fuelling a rise in mass killings, with the violence spreading to such an extent that “there are no more enclaves of stability in Syria today.”

Commission member Vitit Muntarbhorn added both sides are committing war crimes but it appears that “government authorities have been involved more in regard to crimes against humanity.”

The United Nations estimates more than 70,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict that started two years ago as a popular uprising against Assad’s authoritarian rule.

The UN Human Rights Council said yesterday that neither side in the civil war was doing enough to protect civilians. It described Syria as a “marketplace of war,” opening the door to rampant corruption and extortion.

The Geneva-based council said some 2.5 million Syrians have been internally displaced and a further million have fled the country as refugees.

It added that “failure to resolve this increasingly violent conflict will condemn Syria, the region and the millions of civilians caught in the crossfire to an unimaginably bleak future”.

It said government forces are targeting civilians in bakery queues and funeral processions, while anti-government forces continue to use protected locations, such as mosques, as bases or for weapons storage. The council said both sides were showing “insufficient respect for the protection of the civilian population”.

Another of the most alarming features, it added, has been the use of medical care as “a tactic of war,” with medical personnel and hospitals deliberately targeted and medical access denied on political and sectarian grounds.

Meanwhile, a 40-year-old Syrian man was killed and two of his children injured in a fire which broke out in a refugee camp near the border over the weekend, a Jordanian official said yesterday.

Anmar Hmoud, a government spokesman for Syrian refugee affairs, said the two children – aged seven and 12 – are being treated for serious burns after their tent caught fire at the Zaatari camp late on Saturday. Police are investigating the cause of the blaze.

An earlier fire at the camp
destroyed more than 20 tents, including some hosting small shops. Authorities blamed that blaze, on Friday, on gas cylinders used for cooking. Jordan says it is currently hosting more than 425,000 Syrian refugees.