A UN board of inquiry investigating attacks on civilian establishments in Syria has refrained from directly holding Russia responsible.
The board of inquiry was established in September and its report was supposed to have been submitted by the end of 2019, but was delayed until March.
Western countries for months have demanded that a summary of the report be published, but that too was delayed until now.
Without mentioning Russia, the investigation concluded that in four out of the seven cases studied by the board — a school, a health center, a surgical hospital and a protection center — “the government of Syria and/or its allies had carried out the airstrike.”
“The refusal to explicitly name Russia as a responsible party working alongside the Syrian government… is deeply disappointing,” Human Rights Watch said after the summary was published.
Moscow, on the other hand, has denied that its aircraft targeted civilian sites.
Several western countries and NGOs have argued that air strikes on civilian targets in Syria should be prosecuted as war crimes.
The summary added that multiple member states agreed to provide crucial information for the report, including military sources.
But only four states actually provided such information, which was limited in scope. The report did not identify which states had offered to cooperate or actually participated.
