Syria’s suffering: indiscriminate attacks and barrel bombs

(Vatican Radio) The Human Rights Watch group says indiscriminate attacks and improvised weapons like barrel bombs are having a devastating impact on Syrian civilians as the nation’s civil war enters its fifth year. Aid agencies say 2014 was the worst year of the Syrian conflict so far whilst a separate UN report says life expectancy in Syria has dropped 24 years and 80 percent of the population now lives below the poverty line. 

Lama Fakih is the researcher on Syria for Human Rights Watch and she told Susy Hodges that the international community, through the “paralysis” at the UN Security Council, has failed the Syrian people.

Listen to the full interview with Lama Fakih of Human Rights Watch: 

As the international community marks the 4th anniversary of the start of the Syrian civil war, Fakih says the “huge toll” on civilians during this conflict is devastating, with over 220,000  killed and millions of people displaced.  She blames this on paralysis at the UN Security Council with a lack of unity and resolve among the world powers who are not enforcing past UN resolutions aimed at alleviating the suffering caused by the war.

“The parties to the (Syrian) conflict are not being pressured enough to stop their unlawful practices.”

Human Rights Watch says these unlawful practices include “indiscriminate attacks” by all parties and especially “the use of barrel bombs” that are killing and injuring thousands of Syrian civilians. Dropped from helicopters, the controversial barrel bombs are improvised weapons made from old barrels or water tanks, filled with explosives and scrap metals and are designed to cause maximum damage.