U.S. massacres civilians in wars in the Middle East: report

BEIJING, Aug. 9 (Xinhua) -- The United States has committed crimes by launching wars in the Middle East and surrounding regions that have caused mass killing of civilians, said a report released Tuesday by the China Society for Human Rights Studies (CSHRS).

Titled U.S. Commits Serious Crimes of Violating Human Rights in the Middle East and Beyond, the CSHRS report said that by rallying its allies to launch the Gulf War (1990-1991), the Afghanistan War (2001-2021), the Iraq War (2003-2011), and engaging in the Libyan War and the Syrian War, the United States has created "a humanitarian disaster rarely seen throughout the world."

Citing a report of the Brown University in the United States, the CSHRS pointed out that more than 174,000 people died directly in the war in Afghanistan, of whom more than 47,000 were civilians.

In 2003, the United States bypassed the United Nations and violated a basic principle of international law prohibiting the use of force to launch the Iraq War with excuses fabricated out of thin air, constituting aggression against Iraq, the CSHRS report said.

According to the report, from 2003 to 2021, about 209,000 Iraqi civilians died in wars and violent conflicts, and about 9.2 million Iraqis became refugees or were forced to leave their homeland.

Citing data released by the United Nations, the report also revealed that U.S. military intervention has claimed at least 350,000 lives in Syria, displaced more than 12 million people, and left 14 million civilians in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.

Noting that hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians have been killed in wars the United States waged or participated in, the report said those who committed the crimes "often escape accountability for their illegal and criminal acts there."

"The U.S. military troops' wanton massacre of civilians abroad undoubtedly constitutes a crime against humanity," it said.