Report: Syrian regime killed 18,457 women since 2011

Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime has killed at least 18,457 women since March 2011, a report released yesterday revealed.

Published on International Women’s Day the report by the Syrian Network of Human Rights (SNHR) said indiscriminate rocket bombings, artillery fire, cluster bombs, poison gas, barrel bombs, as well as knives were used in several massacres that “had a sectarian-cleansing nature”.

Entitled “A Bleeding Jasmine”, the publication also documented approximately 6,580 cases of arbitrary arrest of Syrian women since the start of the popular movement. These include at least 225 girls who are under the age of 18.

SNHR estimated that there are at least 2,500 women held in custody, including at least 450 cases of enforced-disappearances. The Syrian authorities deny that the women are being held.

The organisation said that government forces have committed at least 7,500 incidents of sexual violence, including 850 inside detention centres and 400 against girls under the age of 18.

Some 31 female members of the Kurdish PYD forces have been killed, mostly in indiscriminate bombings. The YPG troops, which are affiliated with PYD, arrested approximately 43 women and 24 children under the age of 18 in 2014 only, for compulsory conscription purposes.