Death toll in Syria close to half a million

Death toll in Syria close to half a million

Syrian Center for Policy Research data dwarfs last UN casualty figures

A report by the Syrian Center for Policy Research has said that nearly 12 percent of the Syrian population have been killed or injured in civil war.

According to the report released on Thursday, 470,000 Syrians were killed and 1,900,000 others injured in the war which has entered in its fifth year, following the involvement of other actors such as Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.

This is far above the UN's last death-toll figure of 250,000.

In addition, the conflict-hit country's infrastructure and health system were nearly decimated, researchers said. It added that 400,000 people were killed directly by the violence and another 70,000 lost their lives due to lack of food and medicine plus disease and sanitation problems.

The United Nations stopped collecting statistics about the casualties of Syrian stalemate 18 months ago.

Thursday’s report also said life expectancy had dropped from 70 to 55.4.

- Almost half of population displaced - 

The report said that 45 percent of the Syrian population had been displaced, more than four million have become refugees in other countries and six million others were internally displaced. The report also touched upon economic losses in Syria, saying the war had cost $255 billion and that almost 14 million people had lost their livelihoods.

It also added that poverty increased by 85% in 2015 and health, education and income standards have sharply deteriorated.