AT LEAST 60,000 people have now been killed in Syria’s civil war, with monthly casualty figures steadily increasing since it began almost two years ago, according to analysis.
The death toll calculated by the UN is a third more than the figure of 45,000 given by activists opposed to the regime of president Bashar Assam, the first time that the global body’s estimates are higher.
It comes as activists report that a Syrian plane blasted a service station near Damascus, killing and wounding dozens of people and igniting a huge fire.
Independent experts compared 147,349 killings reported by seven sources, including the government, for the study, which was commissioned by the UN human rights office.
By removing duplicates they arrived at 59,648 individuals killed between the start of the uprising on March 15, 2011, and November 30, 2012.
The real death toll is likely to be even greater because reports containing incomplete information were excluded and a significant number of killings may not have been documented at all.