Syria: UN issues blank ‘statement’ on slaughter of children
FOR some horrors there are no words. This blank statement sums up the latest mass atrocity to rock this devastated nation.
UNICEF has released a blank statement on the latest atrocity to rock Syria, revealing it has no more words left to describe the horror taking place across the country.
The statement from the UN children’s agency features 10 empty lines with quote marks indicating missing text followed with an explanatory footnote.
“UNICEF is issuing this blank statement. We no longer have the words to describe children’s suffering and our outrage,” it said.
“Do those inflicting the suffering still have words to justify their barbaric acts?”
#RunningOutOfWords
— UNICEF MENA (@UNICEFmena) February 20, 2018
Statement from @gcappelaere on the war on children in #Syria
Reports of mass casualties among children in Eastern #Ghouta and Damascus#ChildrenUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/X2FYJ4OPnf
The statement comes after Syrian and Russian air strikes slammed into the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta enclave, leaving more than 100 civilians dead for the second straight day and putting another hospital out of service.
At least 250 civilians have been killed since the escalation began on Sunday, with 58 children among the dead, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Another 1000 people have been wounded and at least 10 hospitals in Eastern Ghouta have been damaged by air strikes or shelling since the surge in strikes began.
ASSAULT ‘BLOODBATH’
Syria’s main opposition group condemned the government onslaught as a “bloodbath” and a “war crime” and warned it may pull out of UN-backed peace talks in protest.
Eastern Ghouta is mostly held by two hard-line rebel groups that often fire rockets and mortar rounds into residential neighbourhoods in east Damascus.
On Tuesday, at least nine people were killed and 49 wounded by rebel fire on the capital, state media reported.
Al-Watan newspaper, which is close to the government, said the bombing campaign “comes ahead of a vast operation on Ghouta, which may start on the ground at any moment”.
Forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have left 400,000 civilians trapped inside Eastern Ghouta for six years.
However attacks on the enclave have intensified this year leading to hundreds of deaths and calls for the attacks to be investigated as a war crime.
DEATH TOLL CLIMBS
Government forces bombed the northeastern suburbs of the Syrian capital for a second straight day on Tuesday.
Rescuers raced to reach survivors in the devastated Damascus suburbs as warplanes and helicopter gunships circled overhead, bombing hospitals, apartment blocks, markets and other civilian targets.
The suburbs are the last major stronghold for rebels in the capital region.
Moscow appeared to endorse the unrestrained assault, which was backed by the Russian air force.
“In keeping with the existing agreements, the fight against terrorism cannot be restricted by anything,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
The towns of Eastern Ghouta were among the first to organise into self-governing collectives and shake off government rule after popular demonstrations against Assad swept through the country in 2011, eventually leading to civil war.
They are also among the last to resist Assad’s determined campaign to bring every last rebellious corner of the country to heel.
Assad and his allies insist they are fighting a war on terrorism.
Russia was supposed to guarantee security and aid access to Eastern Ghouta as part of an agreement it reached with the rebels last August.
But the Syrian government blocked all but a handful of aid convoys, plunging the region into a spiralling humanitarian crisis.
Child malnutrition rates are in the double digits, according to the United Nations, and patients are dying of treatable illnesses and wounds while waiting for medical evacuations.
‘SHAME TO HUMANITY’
Human rights group Amnesty International said the bombing campaign by the Syrian government and its ally Russia in Eastern Ghouta amounted to war crimes.
Amnesty International’s Syria researcher Diana Semaan said the catastrophe in Syria provided a “textbook example of the high price paid by civilians for impunity for mass atrocities”.
“The Syrian government, with the backing of Russia, is intentionally targeting its own people in Eastern Ghouta,” she said.
“People have not only been suffering a cruel siege for the past six years, they are now trapped in a daily barrage of attacks that are deliberately killing and maiming them, and that constitute flagrant war crimes.
“For six years, the international community has stood by as the Syrian government has committed crimes against humanity and war crimes with total impunity.”
Amnesty spoke to medical staff on the ground, many who detailed the high numbers of children killed and injured.
The rights group found staff overwhelmed by hundreds of casualties with medical supplies extremely low or run out altogether.
One doctor who spoke to Amnesty said: “We live in a rich area a few kilometres away from the capital where everything is available, while children here are dying of malnutrition.
“The regime doesn’t allow in any medical supplies or medications, so we are suffering a severe lack of medical supplies, especially now.”
Another medical specialist said it was difficult for health personnel to move around because they are being targeted, along with the whole city.
Other residents spoke of the horror that was continuing to unfold.
Abdelrahman Shahin, a 31-year-old Damascus resident, was walking on the street when a shell landed on a nearby taxi, killing the driver and a passenger.
“It’s a bloody day,” he said.
“The driver was out for his livelihood. His family will be waiting for him.”
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