US-led coalition forces carrying out airstrikes in Syria must redouble efforts to prevent civilian deaths and investigate possible violations of worldwide humanitarian law, Amnesty global urged amid growing reports that scores of men, women and children were killed in their homes in al-Tukhar village, near Manbij, on 18 July.
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SOHR’s director Rami Abdul Rahman told Agence France-Presse he believed the attacks were a mistake, and that the U.S.-led coalition likely thought the civilians were ISIS fighters.
Meanwhile, Syria’s main opposition leader has called for the air strikes to be halted until a full investigation can be conducted into Tuesday’s civilian deaths.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 56 civilians were killed in air strikes north of Manbij on Tuesday, a day after it said 21 civilians were killed in a northern district of the besieged, ISIS-held city.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said residents had been fleeing the village of Tokhar when they were hit.
“If the information supporting the allegation is determined to be credible, we will then determine the next appropriate step”, the statement said.
Recently the SDF, a US-backed group of mainly consisting of YPG militants associated with the PKK terrorist organisation, concentrated their forces upon the strategically important city in an attempt to seize it from DAESH, which took Manbij in 2014.
Ahead of the air strike in Al-Tukhar, Airwars, a website tracking civilian deaths by the US-led coalition, said this is the “worst week” for civilian deaths in the two years since the coalition began its operation against IS.
Colonel Christopher Garver confirmed to the press that the USA military is “looking into” the possible civilian casualties resulting from the air strike.
Syrian civilians react following a reported air strike by Syrian government forces on the rebel-held northwestern city of Idlib, on July 20, 2016. It has become the site of intense conflict since a US-backed alliance composed of Kurdish and Arab militias – known as the Syrian Democratic Forces – entered the city in June.
Syria’s opposition party has demanded the USA cease airstrikes until it figures out what happened here.
As of yet, the USA military has not announced if it will launch a formal investigation into the latest round of alleged civilian deaths in Syria.
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The attacks are the most deadly on civilians since Coalition forces started bombing Islamic State forces.
