UN ‘failed to prevent’ Syria crimes: Opp

RIYADH: The head of Syria´s main opposition group on Saturday accused the United Nations of failing to prevent violence raging in the war-wracked country, including the assault on the Eastern Ghouta rebel enclave.

“We hold the United Nations, the Security Council and the international community ... directly responsible for their silence around these crimes and for failing to take action to prevent these crimes,” Nasr al-Hariri, president of the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC), told reporters in Riyadh. “But let us not forget that the party that holds direct responsibility for the crimes are the Syrian regime and the countries that continue to stand by it”.

Russian-backed Syrian regime forces have waged a blistering assault on Eastern Ghouta that has retaken 70 percent of the enclave near Damascus since February 18.

The offensive has killed around 1,400 civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor which relies on a network of sources on the ground. The assault has sparked an exodus with more than 40,000 civilians pouring into surrounding government-held areas over the past 48 hours. More than 350,000 people have been killed and millions displaced since the Syria war broke out in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.