Human Rights Defenders Submits a Complaint to the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment on Victims of the Targeting of Saraqib Popular Market 12-21-2019
On 12/21/2019, corresponding to Saturday, at exactly 11:31, a Syrian regime Sukhoi Su-22 aircraft took off from T-4 Airport at 11:11, with the code “Zamrud” according to the flight tracking observatories, and launched 3 explosive missiles at once on the city of Saraqib in a popular market, killing 8 people, including 3 women and a child, and injuring 25 people, including a civil defense volunteer, women and children, all of whom were civilians.
These bombings also caused massive destruction in the city’s main streets as well as shops and homes owned by civilians in the city. These attacks also led to a state of panic among civilians and forced them to close their shops in the market and take refuge in underground basements and flee into the unknown.
This attack comes after the fierce campaign launched by the Syrian and Russian governments on December 19, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which indicated that
The regime forces brought in large military reinforcements to the eastern countryside of Maarat al-Numan, where there were intensive Russian raids on that area. The immediate target now is the Damascus-Aleppo international road.
This fierce attack led to hundreds of daily raids on residential areas and popular markets and led to the displacement of more than 220 A thousand civilians have been displaced so far towards Bab al-Hawa areas towards the Syrian-Turkish border, and most of them are living in the open now. The focus of the fire is on Maarat al-Numan and sending indirect messages to the people of Saraqib to empty it because they will be the second target after Maarat al-Numan.
He says Suleiman Issa Executive Director of the Human Rights Protectors Organization: This is not the first time that the Syrian-Russian alliance has targeted popular markets that do not contain any military bases or points.
Throughout the years of the popular movement, the popular markets were a direct target for this alliance with the aim of punishing civilians and displacing them from their villages and cities. All of this was done in a systematic and deliberate manner through guided and unguided missiles and explosive barrels. This is a war crime and a crime against humanity.
The above-mentioned deaths resulting from the attack are the result of the Syrian authorities’ violation of their obligations under customary international humanitarian law, the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols, which prohibit indiscriminate attacks against civilians and the resulting unnecessary suffering. This attack violated the principle of distinction, as set out in Rule 1 of customary international humanitarian law, which requires parties to a conflict to distinguish between combatants and civilians.
in 6 January 2020 Human Rights Guardians Organization submitted a complaint to the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, requesting her to call on the Syrian authorities to stop their attacks on civilians, open an immediate and transparent investigation into these cases, and bring those responsible to justice and punish them.