Study: Children disproportionally killed by Syria bombs, airstrikes

Researchers looking at the grisly deaths of more than 78,000 civilians in Syria found that children were more likely than adults to be killed by bombings and airstrikes.

The study, published Tuesday in the British medical journal BMJ, examined deaths in Syria that took place from March 2011 to January 2015. Researchers found that a quarter of the victims were women and children, and when they broke the figures down by weapon type, bombings and airstrikes had a disproportionate impact on children, NBC News reports. "The government and rebel factions in Syria typically claim that the targets of their bombs and shells are enemy combatant strongholds, but our findings indicate that for Syrian children these are the weapons most likely to cause death," the researchers wrote.

The study found that men primarily died from shootings and executions, and that all participants in Syria's civil war are ignoring a February 2014 United Nations Security Council resolution that called for a stop to civilian attacks. "Given the mortality burden of weapons on children and women in Syria, active measures to stem the flow of heavy armaments to all sides in the Syrian conflict are a possible way to cease hostilities," the researchers wrote.

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