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Wednesday, 20 March 2019

US Killing Civilians With 'Impunity' in Hidden War on Somalia: Report

Common Dreams 

"The attacks appear to have violated international humanitarian law."

A human rights group is accusing the United States of waging a shadow air war in Somalia that is killing civilians with abandon. 

Amnesty International issued its findings on the African war Tuesday evening in a report titled The Hidden US War in Somalia (pdf).

The U.S. has been covertly engaging in conflicts in Somalia for decades, but in April 2017, the Donald Trump administration upped airstrikes and attacks targeted at the rebel group Al-Shabaab.

The human rights advocacy group studied five of more than 100 strikes on Somalia over the past two years and found that 14 civilians were killed in the attacks. Eight others were injured, the report says.

"These five incidents were carried out with Reaper drones and manned aircraft in Lower Shabelle," Amnesty said in a press release, "a region largely under Al-Shabaab control outside the Somali capital Mogadishu."

The U.S. military denied to Amnesty that any civilians have been killed as a result of American operations in Somalia.

However, Amnesty's report claims its methodology is sound and that the evidence is overwhelming. 

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