International rights organisation Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Monday that the recent attacks claimed by Islamic State (IS) on crowded markets and hospitals in Iraq’s capital of Baghdad are crimes against humanity.
In its statement, HRW said that Iraqi authorities should compensate the victims of terrorist attacks and “military errors”. Director of the terrorism and counterterrorism programme at HRW said that the Iraqi and international strategy against IS shouldn’t ignore the victims of these unlawful attacks.
The statement continued that international law obliges governments to protect their citizens and address the needs of victims. Recent attacks in Iraq had targeted Shi’a-majority districts in Baghdad.
A series of terrorist attacks hit Iraq over the past few weeks, and most of them were claimed by IS. The terrorist attacks left dozens killed and several injured.
Iraq has taken several measures to compensate the victims of terrorist attacks and military errors through a law that was activated in 2009 and amended in 2015. However, HRW believes that there should be a more comprehensive national plan for compensation mechanisms.
According to reports by the United Nations, about 7,000 civilians were killed in Iraq in 2016. It highlighted that these statistics don’t include the entire number of casualties.
