GENEVA: Entire families including women and children were killed in Syria’s coastal region as part of a series of sectarian killings by the army against an insurgency by Bashar al-Assad loyalists, the UN human rights office said on Tuesday.

Pressure has been growing on Syria’s religious-led government to investigate after reports by a war monitor of the killing of hundreds of civilians in villages where the majority of the population were members of Assad’s minority Alawi sect.

“In a number of extremely disturbing instances, entire families — including women, children and individuals hors de combat — were killed, with predominantly Alawi cities and villages targeted in particular,” UN human rights office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan said, using a French term for those incapable of fighting.

So far, the UN human rights office has documented the killing of 111 civilians and expects the real toll to be significantly higher, Al-Kheetan told a Geneva press briefing. Of those, 90 were men; 18 were women; and three were children, he added.

Govt’s fact-finding body says Damascus determined to ‘prevent unlawful revenge’

“Many of the cases documented were of summary executions. They appear to have been carried out on a sectarian basis...,” Al-Kheetan told reporters. In some cases, men were shot dead in front of their families, he said, citing testimonies from survivors.

A wave of violence broke out last Thursday, mainly along the Mediterranean coast, the heartland of the Alawi minority, the worst since former president Bashar al-Assad was ousted in December. Security forces and allied groups killed at least 1,093 civilians since Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor.

Fact-finding committee

A fact-finding committee formed by Syria’s new authorities to investigate a wave of deadly violence said on Tuesday the country was determined to “prevent unlawful revenge”.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk also welcomed the announcement by Syria’s government to create an accountability committee and called for those investigations to be prompt, thorough, independent and impartial, the spokesperson added.

At a press conference in Damascus, fact-finding committee spokesman Yasser al-Farhan said: “The new Syria is determined to enshrine justice and the rule of law, protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens, prevent unlawful revenge and guarantee that there is no impunity.” Farhan said the committee was working on “gathering and reviewing evidence” related to the wave of violence.

He added the committee would “listen to the eyewitnesses” and establish mechanisms for people to contact the investigators, as well as gather and verify video evidence. The findings will be submitted to the presidency and the judiciary, Farhan said.

In Jableh in coastal Syria, a resident said he had been terrorised by armed groups. “More than 50 people from among my family and friends have been killed,” he said. “They gathered bodies with bulldozers and buried them in mass graves.”

The presidency announced on Sunday the formation of the committee to “investigate the violations against civilians and identify those responsible for them”. It said it would present its findings within 30 days and that those found to be responsible for violations would be referred to the judiciary.

The ensuing killings, mainly targeting members of Assad’s Alawi minority, have been described as a “massacre” by the Observatory, local Christian leaders and US officials.

Published in Dawn, March 12th, 2025