© Agence France-Presse/Imed LamloumHuman Rights Watch wants NATO to probe alleged civilian deaths during last year's bombing campaign
At least 72 Libyan civilians were killed last year by NATO air attacks, a third of them children and teenagers, according to
a report by Human Rights Watch released Monday.
The report raises questions about whether the Western alliance bombed Libyan villages that were not legitimate military targets, despite NATO's insistence that its own review shows that all bombing sites were valid targets.
NATO said it used "unprecedented care and precision" to spare civilians during the air assaults, meant to protect the Libyan people against military attacks carried out under strongman Moammar Kadafi. The air attacks were part of a campaign in Libya authorized by the United Nations Security Council in March 2011 that helped oust Kadafi, who was captured and killed in October.
"Not one of the targets struck was approved for attack, or was in fact attacked, if NATO had any evidence or other reason to believe that civilians would be injured or killed in a strike," the North Atlantic Treaty Organization said in a February letter to a United Nations commission investigating human rights violations in Libya.