Airwars director Chris Woods said the organization will “continue to track Russian civilian casualty allegations on a daily basis,” but will suspend its detailed case-by-case assessments for the near future. The Pentagon denied that there were any civilian casualties but has launched a formal investigation into the incident. As Syrian forces advance into opposition-held Hama in central Syria, Airwars has recorded roughly 50 civilian casualty events caused by the joint Russian and Syrian air campaign in March. Airwars uses varying methods to investigate and confirm civilian casualties, relying on a medley of local news outlets, NGOs, civilian volunteers and social media to determine if casualty reports are fair, weak, contested or disproved. In recent months, the Pentagon said it has taken strides to investigate a backlog of claims while starting to release monthly civilian casualty assessments.

Source: Washington Post March 24, 2017 19:02 UTC