US airstrikes civilian infrastructure
© Ahmad AL-Rubaye / AFP
The US military has released its assessment of civilian casualties in US airstrikes in Iraq and Syria over the past 10 months. Official data suggest 64 people were killed and eight more injured in 24 separate strikes since November 2015.

"In each of the cases released today, the assessment determined that although all feasible precautions were taken and strikes complied with laws of armed conflict, civilian casualties unfortunately did occur," Colonel John Thomas, a spokesman for US Central Command, said in a statement.

Mitigating civilian casualties remains a "key component" of the anti-IS (Islamic State, formerly ISIS/ISIL) air campaign in Syria and Iraq, the military emphasized, acknowledging a handful of deadly strikes which were blamed on the US-led coalition.


Comment: How is bombing hospitals, wedding parties, residential areas and civilian infrastructure meant to 'mitigate' civilian casualties?

For instance, according to a statement made on November 20 last year, five civilians were killed near Dayr Az Zawr, eastern Syria, when they happened to be in the target area of a US air strike. A further 10 civilians were killed in a strike on March 5, near Mosul, northern Iraq, when the US-led coalition targeted a terrorist "weapons production facility," the statement added.

"We've applied lessons learned to reduce the likelihood of future civilian casualties," Thomas said.

The latest information does not include an investigation into a coalition air strike in mid-July near Manbij, in Syria's Aleppo Governorate, which according to some reports killed dozens of civilians. The military said that investigation is nearing completion.


Comment: The US-backed assault on Manbij, targeted residential areas and infrastructure which led to the deaths of hundreds of civilians, at least officially confirmed. Unofficially, the number of dead is likely to have exceeded up to one thousand.


Meanwhile, Major Josh Jacques, a spokesman for the US Central Command stated that the latest figures bring the total civilian death toll in the US anti-terrorist campaign to 119 civilians since the air strikes began in 2014.

Washington's assessment contradicts figures released late last month by Amnesty International which claimed that at least 300 civilians were killed in just 11 airstrikes conducted by the US-led coalition in Syria alone.

"We fear the US-led coalition is significantly underestimating the harm caused to civilians in its operations in Syria," said Lynn Maalouf, Deputy Director for Research at Amnesty International's Beirut regional office, at the time.

An American-led intervention in Iraq started on June 15, 2014, when President Barack Obama ordered US forces to be dispatched to the region in response to highly successful offensives in Iraq conducted by IS terrorists. In September 2014, without any permission from Damascus, the United States and its allies began to strike targets inside Syria.

The latest toll figures also do not include the civilian death toll in the US-led military operation to recapture the Islamic State stronghold of Mosul, northern Iraq. The Russian military said that the coalition repeatedly hit residential areas in and around the Iraqi city on a number of occasions, presenting satellite evidence of the strikes.

As the offensive prepares to enter the intensive urban warfare phase, humanitarian organizations have voiced concerns that the hostilities will take a further significant toll on the civilian population of the city, which is the second most populous in Iraq.