Syria war toll over 162,000: NGO

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says it has documented the deaths of 162,402 people since the country erupted in war in March 2011.

Syrian citizens walk in a destroyed area of Homs province

(AAP)

More than 162,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflict broke out in March 2011, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says.

The Britain-based monitoring group, which relies on a network of sources on the ground, said on Monday it had documented the deaths of 162,402 people.

Among them were 53,978 civilians, including 8607 children.

The group said 42,701 members of the armed opposition had been killed, including more than 13,500 fighters from jihadist groups like al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant or ISIL.

The new toll includes 61,170 regime forces, 37,685 of them from the military, and 23,485 members of a pro-regime militia.

The Observatory also documented the deaths of 438 members of Lebanon's Hezbollah movement, which is fighting alongside the regime, and 1224 other non-Syrian pro-regime fighters.

The toll also includes 2891 unidentified people whose deaths the Observatory has confirmed without being able to record their identities.

The last toll from the Observatory, issued at the beginning of April, stood at just over 150,000 people.

The conflict in Syria erupted in March 2011, with peaceful anti-government protests that the authorities responded to with force.

It has also displaced nearly half the country's population.


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Source: AAP



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