US-Led Coalition Hides War Crimes in Syria by Fabricating Russian Strikes – Russian MoD

MOSCOW- The US-led coalition is attempting to divert attention from its war crimes by fabricating evidence of Russian airstrikes in Syria, the Russian General Staff said Friday.

The Chief of the Russian General Staff Main Operational Directorate Lt. Gen. Sergei Rudskoy said that a US Air Force jet attacked a school near the Iraqi city of Mosul, leaving dead and injured, on October 24. This was not the first statement made by Russian defense ministry’s officials on civilian casualties as a result of US-led coalition’s strikes in Iraq and Syria, Sputnik reported.

 The Russian Defense Ministry said Saturday that the US-led coalition launched strikes on a funeral procession in the Iraqi town of Daquq near the city of Kirkuk, killing dozens of civilians.

“We pass all materials with their decoded results to representatives of the media. We hope that the US fulfills its promise and conducts an objective investigation of these war crimes,” Rudskoy said.

Lt. Gen. Sergei Rudskoy said the accusations of inaccurate strikes continue despite no Russian warplanes’ flights over Aleppo for the 10th day running.

“All this is done with one purpose: to distract the international community from war crimes committed by the US-led coalition,” Rudskoy said.

The Russian general said that the “disseminated tragedy involving a school in Idlib” yet again proves that.

On Thursday, the executive director of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Anthony Lake claimed that as many as 22 children and six teachers were killed in an attack on a school in Idlib. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova condemned the attack on a school in Syria’s Idlib and called for an investigation into the bombing. She also said that international media “launched an attack” on Russia by claiming that Moscow and Damascus are behind the bombing without presenting evidence.

Before any investigation into the attack has been conducted, US officials have been quick to accuse Moscow and Damascus of the alleged attack on the school, however, did not present any evidence proving the claims.

On Thursday, the Russian Defense Ministry said that no Russian aircraft have been in the area, adding that a US Predator drone has been registered in the area where the school had been attacked.

The ministry added that video footage published in media showing the alleged strike on the Idlib school have been fabricated.

 Earlier, the Russian Defense Ministry said that targeting mistakes by the member countries of the international coalition occur too often. “Weddings, funerals, hospitals, police departments, humanitarian convoys and even Syrian troops, fighting against Daesh terrorists near Deir ez-Zor, become targets for coalition airstrikes,” Russia’s Defense Ministry spokesperson Major-General Igor Konashenkov stressed.

Coalition’s Attacks on Residential Areas in Syria Since 2015 Led to Mass Deaths

According to a document distributed by Russia’s permanent mission to the UN’s Geneva office, the US-led coalition has attacked civilian infrastructure since October 2015, leading to mass casualties.

The document, whose title translates as “List of War Crimes by the US and its Allies in Syria” from Russian, goes on to enumerate airstrikes on hospitals and other sites across Syria that led to a growing civilian death toll.

The document says attacks on civilian infrastructure began on October 10, 2015, when a US-led coalition’s strike in Aleppo destroyed a power plant. As a result of the attack, there was no electricity in the city, including in hospitals. On December 6, 2015, the coalition’s warplanes struck the Syrian army’s ammunition depot in the Deir ez-Zor province, killing 4 soldiers and injuring 16.

Moreover, on February 15, 2016, the coalition launched an attack on a Doctors Without Borders’ hospital in Maarrat al-Nu’man in the Hama province, killing nine and injuring 26.

On July 19, an airstrike launched by the US-led coalition’s warplanes in the Aleppo province killed 125 civilians and destroyed several residential buildings. Also in the Aleppo province, the coalition’s attack killed 41 civilians in a village located near Manbij. Moreover, 20 civilians, including three children, died in Syria after strikes by the coalition in the Aleppo province on October 5.

H.M