US-led coalition warplanes pound northeastern Syria, kill scores of civilians

Scores of civilians have lost their lives or sustained injuries when the US-led coalition purportedly fighting the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group carried out a series of aerial assaults in Syria’s northeastern province of Hasakah.

Local sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Syria’s official news agency SANA that the US-led aerial attacks targeted al-Sirajieh village in the al-Shadadi area of the province.

The development came only a day after US-led fighter jets bombarded al-Safawi village in the southeastern part of Hasakah, leaving three civilians, including a child, dead. Two people also suffered serious injuries in the airstrike.

Last month, the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates, in two separate letters sent to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and former rotating President of the UN Security Council Mansour Ayyad al-Otaibi, said that the only goal of the “rogue” US-led military alliance was to undermine Syria’s sovereignty, unity, and territorial integrity and to prolong the current crisis.

“The Syrian Arab Republic urges the Security Council to shoulder its responsibility regarding establishment of international peace and security, and act immediately to stop the war crimes being committed by this alliance against the Syrian people, and ensure that they do not occur again,” said the letters on February 27.

The Syrian Foreign Ministry also demanded an end to the illegal presence of US forces on the Syrian soil, and cessation of suspicious plans by Washington to divide Syria and plunder its resources.

The US-led coalition has been conducting airstrikes against what are said to be Daesh targets inside Syria since September 2014 without any authorization from the Damascus government or a UN mandate.

The military alliance has repeatedly been accused of targeting and killing civilians. It has also been largely incapable of achieving its declared goal of destroying Daesh.