Syria experts sent to Moscow to help Putin’s barrel bomb campaign

Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 03, 2022 in Moscow, Russia [Kremlin Press Office/Anadolu Agency]

Russian President, Vladimir Putin, has drafted Syrian barrel bomb specialists to Russia, aiding the Russian war in Ukraine, the Guardian reports.

Putin blindly bombs Syria – Cartoon [Sarwar Ahmed/MiddleEastMonitor]

According to the report, European intelligence officers told the Guardian that more than 50 specialists have been in Russia for several weeks working alongside officials from Putin’s army to potentially prepare for a similar brutal campaign in the Ukraine war.

Barrel bombs are deadly weapons made of oil barrels, fuel tanks, or gas cylinders, which are packed with explosives, fuel, and metal fragments and dropped from helicopters and planes on civilians.

According to the Syrian Network for Human Rights report, the Syrian regime dropped 81,916 barrel bombs, killing 11,087 civilians, including 1,821 children and 1,780 women.

In Syria, Assad forces’ use of chlorine as a chemical weapon is a violation of its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention, to which it is a party, as well as UN Security Council Resolution 2118.

The report says Putin has prepared the army to use barrel bombs against Ukrainian civilians. Since the beginning of the Ukraine War, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has recorded 7,964 civilian casualties in the country, with 3,778 killed and 4,186 injured.

READ: Conditions continue to spiral in Syria’s Rukban camp as regime tightens siege

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