A/HRC/28/69 rules of international humanitarian law, amounting to war crimes. They have perpetrated crimes against humanity, entailing individual criminal responsibility for the direct perpetrators of crimes and their authors at the highest levels of the chain of command, including the highest levels of Government. 2. Non-State armed groups Anti-Government armed groups 197. Anti-Government armed groups operating in eastern Ghouta (Rif Damascus) continued to carry out indiscriminate attacks against residential neighbourhoods in Damascus city. These mortar attacks resulted in civilian casualties, killed and maimed children. On 30 September, Douela’a in Rif Damascus was shelled by non-State armed group fighters from the direction of Doukhaniyah, killing a 10-year-old boy and injuring other civilians who were walking along a residential street. 198. According to witnesses and victims of non-State armed group attacks in Busra AlSham, (Dara’a) the shells often hit civilian targets and many of the resulting casualties were children. In an attack on 7 October, mortar shells were fired at the Busra Al-Sham hospital, killing a 13-year-old girl who was standing in the hospital’s courtyard. 199. As armed groups have gained a foothold in southern governorates, hostilities have taken place between Bedouin military and Druze localities in As-Suweida. On 16 August 2014, following attacks on local Druze civilians, Bedouin militants allied with Jabhat AlNusra killed a 13-year-old boy at close quarters. 200. On 12 November 2014, a rocket fired by non-State armed groups hit the Karnaz Female School in Karnaz (Hama). The attack took place at approximately 10:15 am during morning recess when children were playing in the school’s courtyard. Seven children were killed in the attack and many others severely injured. As parents came to search for their children, “each father or mother shouted and looked for his or her child, crying and screaming.” A nearby medical clinic was also damaged in the shelling attack. Parents described how their children, who survived the attack, were distressed and experienced trauma in the aftermath. 201. In the course of hostilities between armed groups and Government forces in Adra Al-Omalia, Jabhat Al-Nusra and Jaysh Al-Islam abducted hundreds of civilian residents in December 2013. Around 25 September, the hostages were transferred by armed groups when Government forces regained control over Adra Al-Omalia. The hostages, many of whom are young children, continue to be held in an unidentified location. In early August 2014, an armed group kidnapped nine members of one family, including a 12-year-old boy and a 10-year-old girl, from a village in Hama. The family were reportedly taken hostage to force a relative’s defection from the army. 202. On 10 July, during an attack on Al-Rahjah village (Hama), Jabhat Al-Nusra fighters beheaded a man in front of his children. Months later and displaced from their home, his children continued to suffer the impact of the attack. 203. Of the 6.5 million internally displaced persons in Syria, half are children. With many IDPs fleeing into areas under non-State armed group control, they are vulnerable to the conduct of non-State armed group fighters. Separated from their communities, and often their families and parents, children are at risk of being targeted and instrumentalised. Armed groups continue to recruit and train children for active participation in hostilities. Children’s membership in armed groups exposes them to injury and death in the course of hostilities and to retaliation from other armed groups. A 16-year-old boy who had been recruited and trained by Jabhat Al-Nusra in Dayr az Zawr, was imprisoned by ISIS upon capture and then recruited into their ranks. 51