US-led coalition airstrikes kill 40 people in Syria's Dayr al-Zawr

Rasa - Dozens of civilians, mostly women and children, have been killed when the US-led coalition purportedly fighting the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group conducted fresh airstrikes against residential areas in Syria’s eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr.

News ID: 441588

Date: 18 November 2018 - 14:33

RNA - Local sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Syria’s official news agency SANA that US-led military aircraft struck the village of al-Buqa'an on the outskirts of Hajin town on Saturday, leaving at least 40 people dead.

The development came only two days after 17 people of the same family lost their lives when US-led coalition fighter jets fired missiles into buildings in Albu Badran village.

Most of the slain civilians had apparently been displaced earlier from the nearby town of al-Baghuz in the Abu Kamal district of Dayr al-Zawr province. The town has recently witnessed fierce clashes between Daesh terrorists and militants from the Kurdish Democratic Union Party.

Separately on Thursday, US-led warplanes struck al-Susah village in the same Syrian province. Six civilians were killed and several buildings destroyed in the aerial attacks.

On November 13, the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates condemned a recent airstrike by the US-led coalition against the eastern town of al-Shaafah, which left more than 60 people dead and injured, arguing that the massacre clearly pointed to the fact that members of the military alliance had no respect for moral values, international rules and regulations besides the lives of innocent civilians.

The ministry, in two separate letters, addressed to United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres and the rotating president of the UN Security Council Ma Zhaoxu, called on the Security Council to fulfill its responsibilities and stop US-led aerial assaults.

It also asked the world body to propose an international, independent and impartial mechanism to investigate the crimes being perpetrated by the US-led coalition.

The letters noted that the coalition was deliberately targeting Syria civilians and making use of internationally banned weapons, including white phosphorus bombs, in Syria.

According to Press TV, the ministry stressed that US-led coalition airstrikes were meant to kill as many Syrian people as possible, prolong the ongoing Syrian conflict, destroy the country’s infrastructure and undermine its sovereignty and territorial integrity in flagrant violation of all UN Security Council resolutions on Syria.

The letters concluded that the embarrassing silence of the Security Council had encouraged the US-led coalition to kill more Syrian civilians and destroy their property.

The US-led coalition has been conducting airstrikes against what are said to be Daesh targets inside Syria since September 2014 without any authorization from the Damascus government or a UN mandate.

The military alliance has repeatedly been accused of targeting and killing civilians. It has also been largely incapable of achieving its declared goal of destroying Daesh.

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