BEIRUT (Reuters) - More than 40,000 people have been killed in 20 months of conflict between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces and those fighting for his overthrow, a violence monitoring group said on Friday.
Rami Abdelrahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said about half the fatalities were civilians and the other half split about evenly between rebels and government soldiers.
“The figure is likely much higher as the rebels and the government lie about how many of their forces have died to make it look like they are winning,” Abdelrahman told Reuters.
The British-based Observatory, which supports the opposition, has been collating the names of the dead since government security forces started shooting pro-democracy protesters in March 2011.
Army defectors and ordinary Syrians took up arms against Assad and a civil war has since taken hold.
Abdelrahman said he only counts deceased people whose deaths are confirmed by friends or relatives.
“There are 10,000 to 15,000 people who were arrested months ago so we can’t use that number as we don’t know if they are dead or alive,” he said.
Reuters cannot independently confirm the figures due to severe reporting restrictions imposed by the Syrian authorities.
Re: More than 40,000 killed since start of Syria conflict
There are many apologists for Israel on this forum.
People have only started to die in Syria because of insurgents sent in by the US and its allies to topple the Syrian government. The country is in a civil war and sophisticated weapons are being used by the insurgents. This is inevitable. 40,000 seems like a gross over exaggeration and many of them will be militants and soldiers.
Re: More than 40,000 killed since start of Syria conflict
At the end of the say its Syrians killing Syrians, before that Libyans killing Libyans, Iraqis killing Iraqis and Pakistanis killing Pakistanis. Meers and Jaffars of today.
Re: More than 40,000 killed since start of Syria conflict
At the end of the say its Syrians killing Syrians, before that Libyans killing Libyans, Iraqis killing Iraqis and Pakistanis killing Pakistanis. Meers and Jaffars of today.
All of them have an American connection somewhere.
Re: More than 40,000 killed since start of Syria conflict
There could or not be an American connection. But I blame more the agents among our countries who play the games for other countries.
Which other countries do you have in mind besides the US and its allies?
Agents that do it at the behest of other countries are responsible, countries that sponsor the agents are responsible, countries that invade to further their agenda and as a result cause bloodshed and a strong reaction are responsible.