Islamic State attack on Hassakeh displaces 60,000: U.N.

The Islamic State’s ongoing attack on the divided city of Hassakeh has displaced 60,000 people, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported.

The Islamists launched a major attack on government-held portions of the northeastern city on Thursday and said they have captured the southeastern al-Nashwa district as well as some neighboring areas, Reuters reported.

The U.N. body estimated that 50,000 people have relocated to other parts of the city, while 10,000 have left northward toward Amuda, close to the Turkish border.

“An estimated 200,000 people may try to flee the city in the coming hours to northern areas of the governorate, most likely towards Amuda and Qamishli,” it said of the attack on the city, which is divided into zones run separately by the government of President Bashar al-Assad and a Kurdish administration.

Qamishli is a city around 80km north of Hassakeh that sits on the Turkish border.

Islamic State attack on Kobani ‘second worst massacre of civilians’: monitor

In a related development, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the simultaneous Islamic State attack on the Kurdish-held town of Kobani and a nearby village on Thursday has so far killed at least 146 civilians, Reuters reported.

Clashes in the town between Islamic State and YPG, the armed wing of the Kurdish Supreme Committee, are continuing, the monitoring group said, adding that it was the second largest massacre of civilians by the Islamists since the start of the war.

More than 80 groups demand U.N. Security Council stop Syria’s use of barrel bombs

A collection of more than 80 international human rights and aid groups have demanded the U.N. Security Council help stop the Syrian government’s use of barrel bombs to target civilians, Reuters reported.

In their letter, the groups called the council’s response to barrel bombs so far as “woefully inadequate.”

Last week, more than 70 countries expressed “outrage” and demanded that the council prevent Syria’s air force from using the weapons, which are prohibited by international humanitarian law because they kill indiscriminately.

The Security Council will meet informally on Friday to discuss the international community’s response to Syria’s civil war. It called last year for an end to the use of barrel bombs, but has not followed up this statement. Syrian ally Russia, in particular, has blocked any substantive action.

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