GENEVA – Syrian security forces have killed 2,700 anti-government protesters since an uprising against President Bashar al-Assad started in March, including at least 100 children, the United Nations human rights office said yesterday.
Kyung-wha Kang, deputy UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said her office was prepared to send its confidential list of 50 suspects linked to alleged crimes against humanity to the International Criminal Court, if the Security Council referred the situation in Syria to the Hague-based court.
She called on Dr Assad’s government to co-operate with an international inquiry into the bloodshed so as to ensure accountability for all violations and to “break the culture of impunity in the country”.
“As of today, 2,700 people, including at least 100 children, have been killed by military and security forces since mass protests erupted in mid-March,” Ms Kang said in a speech to the UN Human Rights Council.
“Let me conclude by emphasising the importance of holding perpetrators of crimes against humanity accountable. The office has found that such crimes may have been committed in Syria,” she said, citing a UN report issued in August.
Ms Kang, in response to questions about the office’s list of 50 alleged perpetrators, said of the ICC: “Should the court be engaged and request the office’s assistance at any stage of its investigation into violations in Syria, the office will be ready to provide them with the information, including the confidential list of names as appropriate.”
French foreign minister Alain Juppé, speaking in New York, also said that Syria must answer for crimes against humanity.
Syrian security forces, “backed by tanks, helicopters and snipers” continue to crush protests in cities including Homs, Latakia, Deraa and Damascus, Ms Kang told the 47-member forum.
A large-scale assault in Homs this month had left at least 23 civilians dead and scores injured, she said.
In more violence yesterday, Syrian security forces killed at least six villagers and two rebel soldiers in a sweep on the countryside north of Homs, activists and residents said.
Syria’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Faysal Khabbaz Hamoui, rejected as biased both Ms Kang’s presentation and the findings of the preliminary UN report, drawn up by UN investigators who were not allowed to enter the country.
US ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe denounced the Syrian government’s “continued campaign of repression” and reiterated Washington’s call for Assad to step down.