Iraqi forces dropping barrel bombs in Fallujah, Human Rights Watch says
Government troops in Fallujah may be targeting hospital as they battle militants
Iraq's government is dropping barrel bombs and may also be targeting a hospital in its battle with militants in the conflict-hit city of Fallujah, Human Rights Watch alleged yesterday.
The Iraqi authorities denied the claims, which come with Baghdad locked in a months-long stand-off with anti-government fighters in Fallujah amid a surge in nationwide bloodshed, all of which is fuelling fears the country is slipping back into the all-out conflict of 2006 and 2007.
The New York-based rights watchdog also said abuses committed by the powerful Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant jihadist group - among the main militant organisations in Fallujah - were likely to amount to crimes against humanity.
HRW said that the military denied targeting Fallujah's main hospital, and the prime minister's spokesman issued a statement on May 12 denying the use of barrel bombs.
HRW's Iraq researcher Erin Evers said the militant groups had carried out "horrible crimes" but even these could not be equated to "the crimes of a government that has rescinded responsibility for protecting its civilian population".
The crisis in the desert province of Anbar, which borders Syria, erupted in late December when security forces dismantled a longstanding protest camp maintained by the province's mainly Sunni Arab population to vent their grievances against the government.