A/HRC/40/70 Commission also received accounts of an alleged air strike on 29 November that struck the Yarmouk women’s hospital in Sha’fah city, causing civilian deaths. 48. While information in relation to the foregoing incidents requires further corroboration, numerous attacks by the international coalition resulting in death or injury to civilians, including those striking specially protected objects, such as hospitals and cultural property, raise serious concerns that war crimes and other violations of international law may have been committed. 49. Though SDF captured Hajin from ISIL by mid December, the battles came at an extremely high cost to civilians.21 The Commission continues to investigate international coalition air strikes carried out between October and December that reportedly resulted in numerous civilian casualties. In areas adjacent to Hajin, clashes between SDF and international coalition forces against ISIL continue. V. Life behind the frontlines 50. Compounding civilian suffering caused by ongoing hostilities, thousands of armed group members and their families were evacuated to the north and north-west of the country from areas previously besieged by pro-government forces throughout the first half of 2018. Their arrival, coupled with severe socioeconomic hardship and a general absence of the rule of law, aggravated existing instability in both Idlib and Aleppo Governorates. Idlib Governorate 51. Two main umbrella coalitions dominated Idlib during the reporting period: the NFL and the terrorist group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham. At the time of writing, some 55,000 armed group fighters and Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham militants inhabited Idlib. As they vie for control over limited resources and beleaguered civilian populations, infighting among groups with competing agendas and extremist ideologies continues to have a negative impact on civilian life. An extensive pattern of kidnappings and abductions has emerged, for example, in which members of armed groups and criminal gangs in Idlib abduct affluent civilians, including doctors and humanitarian actors, and hold them for ransom to finance their activities. Victims are most often taken from their workplaces and driven in vans with tinted windows to unknown locations. Some abductees described being held in basements, often in solitary confinement, while others were taken to rural areas. In areas under the control of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, numerous civilians continue to be detained arbitrarily for expressing political dissent. Detention, abductions and torture22 52. One health worker abducted from his office in August by a group of unidentified armed and masked men described being tortured and threatened with execution. The victim was released when his family paid a ransom. 53. The Commission documented a number of instances where ransom demands of up to $150,000 were made by abductors, resulting in the eventual release of hostages. There appeared to be a correlation between the decrease in funding provided by international donors over the period under review and the extensive pattern of abductions for ransom by members of armed groups for financial gain. 54. Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham has also been arbitrarily detaining civilians in a systematic effort to stifle political dissent. One activist who was detained with another man in September for taking part in public demonstrations against Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, for example, described being placed in a tyre and beaten with a stick while held in prison. The activist was released two days later, but his friend is still being held. 21 22 See, e.g., S/2018/1129; see also S/2018/1009. Protection concerns prevent the Commission from disclosing certain information in this section, such as place names, that could potentially be used to identify individual sources. In all cases, the Commission remained guided by the “do no harm” principle. 11