[JURIST] The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic [official website] released a report [text, DOC] Tuesday stating that both government troops and opposition rebels are targeting civilians in Syria’s civil war.The report says that the government intentionally targets areas in which civilians regularly congregate, such as marketplaces and bus stations and that it has failed to take reasonable precautions to minimize “incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, and damage to civilian objects.” It found that hospitals and historic monuments are regularly targeted as well, violating the special protection afforded to these facilities by modern international humanitarian law. The report cites new intelligence that chemical weapons were used in two attacks in March and April 2015. The report concludes by saying:

The Syrian people deserve an unambiguous commitment to helping them to return their country to peace. Influential states must make their continued political support conditional on parties’ willingness to compromise and negotiate. To create conditions amenable to negotiations is a shared responsibility. This cannot be achieved without the setting aside of the narrow national interests of a few and the coming together of a community which holds within itself not only the ideals of human rights, but also a deepening realization that, without peace and justice in Syria, all the world will suffer the consequences.

The conflict in Syria [JURIST backgrounder] has continued for five years in a civil war based around the legitimacy of President Bashar al-Assad [BBC reports]. In August the UN reported [JURIST report] that 191,000 have died in the conflict, and that number continues to climb. Last June the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria warned [JURIST report] the UN Human Rights Council that the continuing civil war in Syria conflict has “reached a tipping point, threatening the entire region.” Last May Human Rights Watch [advocacy website] cited evidence [JURIST report] that the Syrian government was using chemical weapons on its own citizens. Last March a panel of UN human rights experts presented a report [JURIST report] that depicted the Syrian rebel practice of “execution fields” where mass killings were committed through the use of barrel bomb attacks.