Update

November 11th 2019 marks the fifth anniversary of Airwars – the international not for profit which monitors civilian harm on the battlefield, and seeks to reduce conflict casualty numbers. November 11th is recognised globally, as Armistice Day, Remembrance Day and Veterans Day. It was also the date on which the name Airwars was registered by […]

On Friday October 18th, Dutch news organisations NRC and NOS published a story in which they accused the Dutch military of being responsible for a 2015 airstrike on an ISIS weapon storage facility in the city of Hawijah, Iraq, that led to the deaths of at least 70 civilians. The Dutch Ministry of Defence has […]

Airwars monitors locally reported civilian harm from all Turkish air and artillery strikes in Iraq and Syria, as well as from Kurdish counterfire actions. Our database can be found here. More than 120 civilian deaths have been locally alleged in eight days of fighting in northern Syria to October 16th, following a Turkish-led offensive, ‘Operation […]

Dmytro Chupryna, Airwars Deputy Director is attending the Vienna Conference on Protecting Civilians in Urban Warfare. As part of our membership of the International Network on Explosive Weapons – which seeks a ban of wide area effect  munition use in urban areas – Airwars will contribute to a discussion on the various forms of harm […]

Foreign powers are increasingly being drawn into Libya’s civil war – with lethal air strikes reportedly carried out by at least two other nations, and with Libya’s two rival governments both hiring foreign mercenary pilots, and receiving shipments of weapons from abroad. Experts are warning that an internationalising of the conflict may further destabilize the […]

The fifth anniversary of the international war against so-called Islamic State has seen the total defeat of the terrorist group as a territorial entity in both Iraq and Syria. Now degraded to insurgency, the US and its allies try to contain the jihadist organisation. However, after five years of fighting the cost to civilians on […]

Despite a significant majority of almost 100 surveyed journalists believing that the reporting of civilian casualties remains critical to broader war coverage, major US news organisations have too often failed properly to report on the issue during the five year conflict against so-called Islamic State. That’s the key finding of a major new Airwars study […]

Airwars Director Chris Woods and report author Alexa O’Brien are presenting at the launch of the new Airwars report ‘News in Brief: US Media Coverage of Civilian Harm in the War Against ISIS’ in Washington DC. Authored by investigative journalist Alexa O’Brien, the report draws on new research and interviews with reporters at major US […]

Dmytro Chupryna, Airwars Deputy Director is speaking at a conference ‘Freedom Across Borders’, organised by Syria Solidarity UK with Amnesty International UK – with the aim of discussing how human rights activism on one conflict can inform and support work on another. Airwars will contribute to a discussion on military accountability, focusing on what can […]

Dmytro Chupryna, Airwars Deputy Director is attending a conference ‘Security Policy Alternatives’: Convening civil society to explore collaborative international engagement on security interventions & counter-terrorism’, organised by Saferworld and Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. Airwars will contribute to the discussion on the collaborative action by civil society to challenge securitised responses to crises and threats, and promote […]

Dmytro Chupryna and Chloe Skinner, Airwars respective Deputy Director and UK based Conflict Researcher and Advocacy Officer, are attending a roundtable discussion on ‘The UK’s Role in Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict’, hosted by Save the Children and the Humanitarian Policy Group at the Overseas Development Institute. The discussion will be attended by representatives […]

American military operations killed 120 civilians in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Somalia last year, according to a report released by the Pentagon today. The report, mandated by Congress, contains a detailed breakdown of the incidents that led to the civilian casualties, including where and when these took place. This differs from last year’s release which […]

On May 16th 2017, Sajid Ahmed Sajid and his brother Amer Ahmad Sajid, two men in their fifties and each with a salt and pepper beard, were killed by a bomb that struck their house in the well-to-do neighbourhood of Al-Najjar in West Mosul, according to locals and local media. The Coalition’s public account of […]

A major new study by Amnesty International and Airwars has concluded that at least 1,600 civilians died in Coalition strikes on the city of Raqqa in 2017 during the battle to evict so-called Islamic State – ten times the number of fatalities so far conceded by the US-led alliance, which had admitted 159 deaths to […]

Airwars Director Chris Woods is presenting at the Frontline Club talk ‘New Reporting Frontiers: OSI, Airstrikes and Civilian Harm’ alongside with world’s leading Open Source Investigations teams to discuss the groundbreaking techniques being used to support and strengthen reporting of civilian harm in conflicts worldwide. From the Skripal poisoning to the Battle of Mosul, Open […]

A major offensive on the Libyan capital Tripoli by Marshal Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) has already seen dozens of civilians locally reported killed – with the United Nations warning that “Civilian casualties and displacement are expected to increase further given the continued use of air strikes and heavy artillery.” Haftar’s assault on Tripoli – […]

Airwars has announced that in partnership with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, it will also now be monitoring airstrikes and reported civilian harm from secretive US campaigns in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, in addition to its current portfolio of major conflicts. The US counter terrorism campaigns – conducted by the CIA and US Special Forces […]

Maike Awater, Airwars’ Netherland based Advocacy Officer and Conflict Researcher presents at a panel discussion commemorating the second anniversary of the Al-Badhiya air strike’s in Syria. The most worst known air strike of the Anti-IS Coalition with over 150 civilian casualties took place on 20 March 2017 when it targeted a shelter for internally displaced […]

Airwars Director Chris Woods is presenting at the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Drones session ‘The human cost of airstrikes: are we counting civilian deaths?’ The Ministry of Defence has been the second-largest contributor to the anti-ISIS Coalition. However, in over 1900 strikes in Iraq and Syria from 2014-2018, it has reported only one civilian […]

Hundreds of journalists will be canvassed for their views on recent conflict casualty reporting by the US media as part of a major new project by Airwars. The six month study—funded by the Reva and David Logan Foundation in the US, and the J Leon Philanthropy Council in the UK—aims to help assess and improve […]

On December 31st 2018, the participation of Netherlands F-16s in the international fight against so-called Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq and Syria came to an agreed end, after almost four years of airstrikes. Despite conducting precision airstrikes, the Coalition has not always been successful in preventing civilian casualties – with the alliance overall admitting at […]

Airwars’ Director Chris Woods is presenting at Oral Evidence Session, organised by  UK Parliament’s Defence Select Committee, on the theme of UK actions in the war against so-called Islamic State, and the broader issue of civilian harm, based on the recently published report. Airwars continues to challenge the Ministry of Defence over its claims of no civilian […]

Airwars will be participating in the conference organised by ECCHR to outline civilian harm caused by the US in Libya from airstrikes which supposedly take off from Sigonella, Italy. Both Airwars and New America will present findings from their joint Libya project, detailing incidents of civilian harm in the North African country and providing a larger perspective […]

Airwars is participating in a gathering of humanitarian practitioners and experts to discuss and reflect upon work undertaken in relation to conflict-related deaths and the significant push behind transparency and accountability with regard to monitoring and reporting on civilian casualties and damage to essential infrastructure. The event also addresses perceived responsibility for the humanitarian consequences […]

Together with a wide range of partners Airwars is participating in a discussion to help develop a deeper understanding about the relationship between digital risk and the protection of individuals and communities affected by situations of armed conflict – and to identify areas for cooperative action to enable humanitarian actors and their partners to respond more […]

Monthly summary: Below are all known published daily Coalition military reports relating to the air war against so called Islamic State or Daesh in Iraq and Syria for December 2018. We have also included relevant video and photo releases. Beginning in June 2018, the Coalition began issuing once weekly reports, issued each Monday for the previous […]

Local reports indicate that up to eleven civilians have been killed in a US precision strike near Al Uwaynat, in the extreme south of Libya close to the Algerian border on November 29th. The United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) has confirmed conducting the strike, originally stating that it had targeted fighters from a regional Al […]

Reported civilian harm from Coalition actions reaches highest level since the battle of Raqqa - while for the first time Airwars monitored no civilian casualty claims from Russian strikes.

Airwars’ Deputy Director, Dmytro Chupryna, is participating in a meeting which brings together civil and military actors  to explore how they might engage in a conflict setting; to discuss if there is a common understanding of Military and Civilian taxonomies; and to examine the relationship constraints and opportunities of command, control communication, co-ordination and collaboration.

Chris Woods, Airwars’ Director is presenting on the theme ‘Invisible Victims: Europe’s failure to concede battlefield civilian harm’ at the symposium, which brings together scholars from different disciplines; human rights and humanitarian experts; and investigative reporters in order to examine the precarious status of civilians and other protected persons in the midst of war.