Mass detention, torture of Syrian children among atrocities documented by UK charity

A boy witnesses his family members blown apart when a rocket falls on a funeral procession. A teenager is imprisoned and tortured in his own school, transformed by the regime into a mass detention center for children. The six-year-old son of an anti-government activist is abducted, then starved and beaten to death.
A new report by the British charity Save the Children documents these and other alleged atrocities in Syria’s 18-month-old civil war that according to activists have left thousands of children dead and many more traumatized. The report released Tuesday compiles 18 first-hand accounts from Syrian refugee children
Although it did not always specify which side had committed the alleged acts, most — random bombardment of civilian areas, mass abductions by mysterious gunmen — have been linked in the past with the regime’s forces or its allied shabiha militias.
“Every crime against children must be recorded to send a clear message to all sides in the conflict that these atrocities will not be tolerated,” the group said.
Among the accounts in “Untold Atrocities: The Stories of Syria’s Children”: Hassan, a 14-year-old boy now living in a refugee tent camp in Jordan, described what happened when a rocket landed in a funeral procession in his home village.
“Dead bodies along with injured people were scattered on the ground,” he said. “I found body parts all over each other. Dogs were eating the dead bodies for two days after the massacre.”