DUSHANBE, February 16, 2016, Asia-Plus — U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says close to 50 civilians have been killed and many more wounded in missile attacks on at least five medical facilities and two schools in northern Syria.
U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said Monday that victims of the attacks included children.
According to the
Associated Press
, he quotes the secretary-general as calling the attacks “blatant violations of international laws” that “are further degrading an already devastated health care system and preventing access to education in Syria.”
Haq quoted Ban as saying the attacks “cast a shadow on commitments” made by nations seeking to end the Syrian conflict at a conference in Munich on February 11, which included a cessation of hostilities within a week and an end to attacks on civilians.
Reuters
reports the carnage occurred as Russian-backed Syrian troops intensified their push toward the rebel stronghold of Aleppo.
Fourteen people were reportedly killed in the town of Azaz near the Turkish border when missiles slammed into a school sheltering families fleeing the offensive and a children”s hospital, two residents and a medic said.
Bombs also hit another refugee shelter south of the town and a convoy of trucks, another resident said.
“We have been moving scores of screaming children from the hospital,” medic Juma Rahal told
Reuters
in an interview.
At least two children were killed and scores of people injured, he said.
In a separate incident, missiles hit another hospital in the town of Marat Numan in Idlib province, in northwestern Syria, said the French president of the Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) charity, which was supporting the hospital.
“There were at least seven deaths among the personnel and the patients, and at least eight MSF personnel have disappeared, and we don”t know if they are alive,” Mego Terzian told
Reuters
.
The European Union”s top diplomat has condemned a deadly attack on a clinic in northern Syria run by the medical aid organization Doctors Without Borders. The
Associated Press
reports EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said Monday that the attack “is completely unacceptable,” but said nothing about who was responsible.
Speaking after chairing talks between EU foreign ministers, Mogherini said they underlined that all hostilities must end, apart from specific action targeting the Islamic State group and Al Nusra Front.
