Rights group says Syrian regime co-opting humanitarian efforts

A leading international rights group says in a new report that the Syrian regime is co-opting humanitarian aid and reconstruction assistance and sometimes using it to "entrench repressive policies."

Human Rights Watch calls on donors and investors to ensure their contributions are used for the good of the Syrian people.

The New York-based group says in a 91-page report released in Geneva on Friday that the Syrian regime has developed a policy and legal framework to divert "reconstruction resources to fund its atrocities, punish those perceived as opponents, and benefit those loyal to it."

Syria's war that began in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-regime protests, is now in its eighth year, and has killed some 400,000 people, wounded more than a million and displaced half the country's population, including 5 million who fled as refugees, mostly to neighbouring countries.