NGO: More than 150,000 killed in Syria conflict

More than 150,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflictbegan in March 2011, a monitoring group said in a new toll released Tuesday.The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had documented the deaths of150,344 people. Of them, 51,212 were civilians, including 7,985 children.The group said 37,781 members of the armed opposition had been killed, includingjihadists from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and the Al-Qaeda affiliatedAl-Nusra Front.A total of 58,480 loyalist forces, including more than 35,000 soldiers, were alsokilled.Included among those killed on the government side were 364 members ofLebanon's Shiite movement Hezbollah.Another 2,871 unidentified people were recorded as having died, the group said.The conflict began with peaceful anti-government demonstrations, inspired bysimilar movements elsewhere in the region, that were brutally suppressed by theregime.In response, part of the opposition took up arms and the conflict spiralled into civilwar.On Tuesday itself, more than 50 people were killed in Damascus and Aleppoprovinces, the Observatory said.Thirty-one of the dead fell in Aleppo, mainly as a result of helicopter attacks by theregime, using barrel bombs on rebel areas.The barrel bombs killed 12 children, six women and three men, said the Observatory,which has previously documented hundreds of casualties in similar air raidstargeting the northern province.Another four children and four adults were killed in a mortar attack by rebelsagainst a regime-held neighbourhood in Aleppo city, said the Observatory.Meanwhile in Damascus province, 12 people were killed. Among them were sixchildren killed by army tank fire on Jabaadin village.