The 12-year-old boy, who was mistakenly identified as a child solider
fighting for President Bashar al-Assad, was killed by fighters said to
be from the US-backed Nour al-Din al-Zinki Movement.
Footage
of the beheading, which has circulated on social media, shows the boy
on the back of a truck being taunted by several men.
"This
is a prisoner from the Quds Brigade," one of the men says. "They don't
have men any more so they've sent us children today."
Another says: "These are your dogs, Bashar, children of the Quds brigade."
In
a statement Nour al-Din al-Zinki called the killing an "individual
mistake" and denounced "the human rights abuses that were shared on
social media sites".
The rebel group said that it had identified the individuals in the footage and formed a committee to probe the death.
It
said: "All individuals who undertook the violation have been detained
and turned over to the committee for investigations in accordance with
the relevant legal standards."
Quds Brigade, a Palestinian faction which fights in Aleppo in support of President al-Assad, denied that the boy is a fighter.
It
said that he was from a poor family living in the Handarat Camp area
north-east of Aleppo, which had fallen under the control of rebels.
The group added: "The child was ill, evidenced by the presence of a drip in his hand".
Footage appears to show the boy with bandages round his waist and one of his legs and a plastic medical tube near his arm.
Amnesty
International said that the boy's murder is an "abhorrent signal that
some such groups are carrying out serious abuses with impunity."
The US State Department has said that it is investigating the killing.
"We
routinely vet the groups we work with and support, as you might expect,
and their human rights record figures prominently in that," a
spokesperson said.
"We do not support groups that condone this sort of barbarity, period.
"We note that al-Zinki has said they will investigate this incident, and we hope they do so thoroughly and transparently."
skynews.com
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