The bombing of four hospitals by the regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad “could amount to war crimes,” UNICEF said in a statement on Tuesday.
Four hospitals and a blood bank in the rebel-held eastern part of Aleppo were hit by airstrikes on Sunday and Monday, disrupting facilities that provide “key life-saving health services for up to 300,000 civilians,” UNICEF said. A two-day-old baby was reported to have been killed in his incubator when the bombing interrupted his oxygen supply. The baby was in the only pediatric hospital in the city, which was hit by airstrikes twice in the space of 12 hours.
UNICEF’s statement didn’t identify the party responsible for the bombing, but of all the actors in the Syrian civil war, only Assad and his ally Russia have aircraft.
“Health facilities in Syria are being attacked with alarming ferocity,” UNICEF continued, citing the World Health Organization’s estimate that 40 hospitals have been attacked this year. Sixty percent of Syria’s hospitals are believed to be closed or only partially operational. Airstrikes on an Aleppo hospital and medical clinic killed dozens of people in April, including the city’s last pediatrician.
Bloomberg News reported Wednesday that government forces have cut off the last rebel supply lines into Aleppo, trapping an estimated 275,000 people in the eastern part of the city, leading to fears of a humanitarian crisis. The United Nations’s humanitarian chief has called for weekly 48-hour humanitarian pauses in the fighting, warning that food supplies could run out by the middle of August.
The Assad regime has frequently used sieges as a tactic against civilians since the civil war began in 2011. NGOs reported earlier this month that around 65 people have died of starvation in the city of Madaya since the regime’s siege began one year ago.
The Commission for International Justice and Accountability, an independent group operating in Europe, has begun collecting evidence of war crimes committed by the Assad regime. The UN formally accused Assad in February of carrying out the “extermination” of prisoners. The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a resolution in March calling for a war crimes tribunal to prosecute Assad and his allies, including Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.
[Photo: Freedom House / Flickr ]