Message #66815

[Psalm 51:17]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/%E2%80%98a-complete-meltdown-of-humanity%E2%80%99-civilians-die-in-fight-for-eastern-aleppo/ar-AAluZXf?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp
‘A Complete Meltdown of Humanity’: Civilians Die in Fight for Eastern Aleppo
12/13/16

GENEVA — Pro-government forces retaking the eastern neighborhoods of the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo have killed at least 82 civilians, the United Nations estimated on Tuesday, in what one official called “a complete meltdown of humanity.”

The death toll, recorded in four neighborhoods — Bustan al-Qasr, al-Fardous, al-Kallaseh and al-Saleheen — included 11 women and 13 children, some shot in the streets as they attempted to flee the fighting, said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, citing reports received by the world body.

Mr. Colville said pro-government forces had also reportedly entered homes and killed those they found inside, including women and children.

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They also shot and killed civilians on Monday in al-Ahrar Square in al-Kallaseh, and in the Bustan al-Qasr neighborhood, he said, adding that an Iraqi militia group had been among the forces involved.

By early Monday evening, opposition groups were estimated to control just a third of a square mile of the city, Mr. Colville said, citing “deeply disturbing reports” of streets filled with bodies that could not be retrieved by residents because of the intensity of the fighting and of the fear of being shot on sight.

Pro-government television channels showed footage of Bustan al-Qasr eerily empty; its residents appeared to have fled, some going to government-controlled areas and others to the shrinking zones still held by rebels.

“Civilians have paid a brutal price during this conflict and we are filled with the deepest foreboding for those who remain in this last hellish corner of opposition-held eastern Aleppo,” Mr. Colville said.

Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the United Nations office coordinating emergency relief, reported that some 37,000 people had fled eastern Aleppo to several western areas of the city and to the surrounding countryside. Some 14,700 took refuge in collective shelters, including in a cotton factory, he said. He called the events “a complete meltdown of humanity.”

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