US Airstrike On Mosul Leaves 200 Civilians Dead
MEP: More than 200 civilians are reported to have been killed in a single US-led coalition raid on Mosul, as the United Nations warns the worst was yet to come for those still trapped in the Iraqi city.
A senior UN official in Iraq told BBC she was stunned by accounts of “terrible loss of life”, after claims that at least 200 people had been killed.
If confirmed, the series of airstrikes would rank among the highest civilian death tolls in an American air mission since the United States went to war in Iraq in 2003. And the reports of civilian deaths in Mosul came immediately after two recent incidents in Syria, where the coalition is also battling the ISIS from the air, in which activists and local residents said dozens of civilians had been killed.
The airstrike was hit the west Mosul neighborhood of Aghawat Jadidah on March 17.
“The coalition has opened a formal civilian casualty credibility assessment on this allegation, and we are currently analyzing conflicting allegations and all possible strikes in that area,” said U.S. Army Col. Joe Scrocca, a Baghdad-based spokesman for the coalition, who added that coalition forces routinely strike Islamic State targets in that area.
Scrocca said the investigation is looking at “multiple allegations placing a strike in the area sometime between March 17 and 23.” The Pentagon previously announced four strikes near Mosul March 17 that destroyed 25 fighting positions, 56 vehicles plus a suicide car.
Iraqi forces have been waging a months-long offensive to recapture Mosul, the last ISIS stronghold in Iraq, which has been occupied since 2014.
