Entire families killed during Syria's violence, UN says

Entire families including women and children were killed in Syria's coastal region as part of a series of sectarian killings by rival groups, the U.N human rights office said on Tuesday.

Pressure has been growing on Syria's Islamist-led government to investigate after reports by a war monitor of the killing of hundreds of civilians in villages where members of Assad's minority Alawite sect lived.

"In a number of extremely disturbing instances, entire families - including women, children and individuals hors de combat - were killed, with predominantly Alawite cities and villages targeted in particular," U.N. human rights office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan said, using a French term for those incapable of fighting.

He said initial reports indicated that the perpetrators, who have not been identified, were both members of armed groups supporting Syria's interim authorities and those associated with the former government.

"They appear to have been carried out on a sectarian basis, in Tartus, Latakia and Hama governorates - reportedly by unidentified armed individuals, members of armed groups allegedly supporting the caretaker authorities’ security forces, and by elements associated with the former government."

So far, the U.N. human rights office has documented the killing of 111 civilians and expects the real toll to be significantly higher, Al-Kheetan told a Geneva press briefing. Of those, 90 were men; 18 were women; and three were children, he added.

"Many of the cases documented were of summary executions. They appear to have been carried out on a sectarian basis...," Al-Kheetan told reporters. In some cases, men were shot dead in front of their families, he said, citing testimonies from survivors.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk welcomed an announcement by Syria's Islamist-led government to create an accountability committee and called for those investigations to be prompt, thorough, independent and impartial, the spokesperson added.