News / Syria

US-led airstrike in north Syria kills 7 civilians: Monitoring group

Sunday, 22 May 2016 4:38 AM [ Last Update: Sunday, 22 May 2016 9:04 AM ]

In this file photo, a pair of US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles fly over northern Iraq after conducting airstrikes in Syria. (© US Air Force)

At least seven civilians have lost their lives when the so-called US-led coalition carried out an airstrike purportedly against a position of the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group in Syria’s strategic northern province of Aleppo, a monitoring group says.

The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the attack struck the village of Arshaf, which lies just 8 kilometers (5 miles) from the embattled town of Marea north of the provincial capital city of Aleppo, on Saturday. The victims were members of the same family, the observatory said.

The London-based monitoring group added that five women and a child were among the victims.

The Local Coordination Committees of Syria, however, said 10 people were killed in the strike against the village.

On May 16, three children and a woman were killed in eastern Syria in airstrikes conducted by the US-led coalition.

Media and local sources said the airstrikes hit al-Bukamal city in the province of Dayr al-Zawr near the border with Iraq, killing four people and inflicting heavy losses on properties.

The US-led coalition has been conducting airstrikes against what are said to be the Daesh terrorists inside Syria since September 2014 without any authorization from Damascus or a UN mandate. The coalition has repeatedly been accused of targeting and killing civilians. It has also been largely incapable of fulfilling its declared aim of destroying Daesh.

Bomb attack kills 8 people in northeast Syria

Meanwhile, at least eight people were killed and nearly two dozen others injured when two bomb attacks struck the northeastern Syrian province of Hasakah.

Local sources said two bombers, clad in an explosives-laden vest, blew themselves up inside Domino restaurant as well as a bakery in Qamishli city, located on the border with Turkey, on Saturday evening, leaving eight people dead and 15 others injured, Syria’s official SANA news agency reported.

Syrians check the site of a bomb attack targeting Kurdish Asayesh security forces in the industrial district of the northeastern Syrian city of Qamishli on August 19, 2015. (© AFP)

Daesh later claimed responsibility for the attack.

Syria has been gripped by foreign-backed militancy since March 2011. Damascus says Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar are the main supporters of the militants fighting the government forces.

United Nations Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura estimates that over 400,000 people have been killed in the Syrian crisis.

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