U.N.: Documented killings in Syria rise to over 92,000

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The overall documented death toll in devastated Syria has reached 92,901, the United Nations said Thursday.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay announced the figure, saying it was a result of an updated analysis carried out by specialists and covers the period between March 2011 and the end of April 2013.

"Unfortunately, as the study indicates, this is most likely a minimum casualty figure," she said. "The true number of those killed is potentially much higher."

The analysis shows a dramatic increase in the average monthly number of documented killings since the beginning of the conflict, from around 1,000 per month in the summer of 2011 to an average of more than 5,000 per month since July 2012, according to the U.N. report.

"This extremely high rate of killings, month after month, reflects the drastically deteriorating pattern of the conflict over the past year," Pillay said.

Nearly 83% of the documented victims are male, while about 8% are female. The genders of the others were not indicated.

The report also tallies the deaths of more than 6,500 minors. More than a quarter of them were under the age of 10, the report said.

The analysis was not able to differentiate consistently between combatants and noncombatants, and around three-quarters of the reported killings do not record the victim's age, according to the report.

Syrian rebels leave their position in the northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan on Thursday, June 13.

The White House said on Thursday that the Syrian government has crossed a "red line" with its use of

chemical weapons. Tensions in Syria flared in March 2011 during the onset of the Arab Spring,

escalating into an ongoing civil war. View the most compelling images taken since the start of the conflict.

Syrian army soldiers take control of the village of Western Dumayna north of the rebel-held city of

Qusayr on Monday, May 13. Syrian troops captured three villages in Homs province, allowing them to

cut supply lines to rebels inside Qusayr town, a military officer told AFP.

Searchers use a flashlight as they look for survivors among the rubble created by what activists say

was a missile attack from the Syrian regime, in Raqqa province, Syria, on April 25.

People walk past destroyed houses in the northern Syrian town of Azaz on Sunday, April 21.

Rescue teams and security forces check out the scene of a deadly car bomb explosion in Damascus

on April 8.

A Free Syrian fighter mourns the death of a friend in Aleppo on March 30, in this photo taken

by iReporter Lee Harper.

Source: CNN.com