Report: Syrian Death Toll Surpasses 100,000
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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(LONDON) — At least 100,000 people have been killed during the 27 months since Syrian President Bashar al-Assad ordered his military to start cracking down on pro-democracy activists in March 2011.
That death toll figure was released Wednesday by the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has been monitoring the conflict that seems far from being resolved.
The group calculates its casualty figures from information collected by both activists and officials on the ground in Syria. Generally, reports from actual combatants are ignored because they tend to be unreliable.
Rami Abdul Rahman, the founder of the Syrian Observatory, added, “The death toll does not include more than 10,000 detainees and missing persons inside of regime prisons, nor does it include more than 2,500 regular soldiers and pro-regime militants held captive by rebel fighters.”
According to the group, more than 36,660 civilian have died, including 8,000 women and children. The dead also include 13,540 rebel fighters, 24,000 Syrian soldiers and 17,300 members of militias and units that are loyal to al-Assad’s government.
Several thousand fighters from other countries have also been killed. Most of them sided with the rebels.
Copyright 2013 ABC News Radio