The sitting room snipers: Surreal pictures show Syrian rebels surrounded by soft furnishings and chandeliers as they take aim from the sofa

• U.N. human rights investigators accuse Syrian government forces of committing war crimes
• It says rebels have also committed war crimes but 'did not reach the gravity, frequency and scale'
• Three people were injured as bomb explodes at parking lot in the capital used by the military
• Scene was 300 yards from hotel popular with UN workers, although no UN staff were hurt
• The civil war has now been raging for 18 months and nearly 20,000 people have been killed
• Today, Syrian air force missiles struck a hospital in a rebel-held area of the city

With sweeping curtains, a chandelier and luxurious sofas, this was once the home of a seemingly well-to-do family in Syria.
But now it is a place of killing, where a rebel sniper was pictured taking aim from the window as his comrades casually lounge around.
The richly-decorated house is in the city of Aleppo, where constant fighting between government forces and rebels is tearing apart the lives of normal citizens.

Sniper on a sofa: A Free Syrian Army fighter fires his sniper rifle from a house in Aleppo

Camouflaged members of the Free Syrian Army are holding positions around Syria's second city to defend it from an assault by troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.
But most of the fighters aren't holed up in such comfortable surroundings, and are instead taking cover in the rubble of their shell-hit city. The civil war has now been raging for 18 months and nearly 20,000 people have been killed - most of them civilians.
Today, U.N. human rights investigators accused Syrian government forces and allied shabbiha militia of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder and torture.
The rebels have also committed war crimes but these 'did not reach the gravity, frequency and scale' of those carried out by the army and security forces, they said.
'The commission found reasonable grounds to believe that government forces and the shabbiha had committed the crimes against humanity of murder and of torture, war crimes and gross violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, including unlawful killing, torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, sexual violence, indiscriminate attack, pillaging and destruction of property,' said the 102-page report by the independent investigators led by Paulo Pinheiro.
Both government forces and armed insurgents had violated rights of children during the 17-month-old conflict, it said.

Taking aim: A Free Syrian Army sniper looks through the sight on his rifle inside a house in Aleppo

The civil war has now been raging for 18 months and nearly 20,000 people have been killed - most of them civilians

Most of the fighters aren't holed up in such comfortable surroundings, and are instead taking cover in the rubble of their shell-hit city

Karen AbuZayd, an American expert serving as senior investigator alongside Pinheiro, said: 'We have identified both parties as guilty of war crimes and of course a greater number and of bigger variety from the government side.
'What happened on the government side appears to be a policy of the state. It is not just widespread but similar large-scale complex operations, how they are carried out, the way the military and security work together,' she said.
Completing their inquiry into a massacre in Houla north of Homs in late May, the investigators said on Wednesday that government forces and Shabbiha fighters were responsible for the killings of more than 100 civilians, nearly half of them children.

The investigators said they would update their confidential list of suspects or units responsible for violations and hand it over to U.N. rights boss Navi Pillay next month.

In Aleppo today, Syrian air force missiles struck a hospital in a rebel-held area of the city wounding one person, a doctor there said, and Human Rights Watch called it was an attack in violation of international law.
Reuters saw at least two gaping holes in the walls and major damage to four floors of the Al Shifaa Hospital which was hit on Tuesday.

Firefighters at the scene after a bomb attached to a fuel truck exploded outside a Damascus hotel

Several people were wounded in the blast, Syria's state TV reported, which took place near a parking lot used by the army command

The remains of the diesel tanker after an explosive device was affixed to the tank section

'If we had lingered just another five minutes, we would have died,' said the doctor who identified himself as Dr Younes. He said he had been performing an operation on the fifth floor just minutes before the attack. He was smeared with blood from treating four patients for shrapnel wounds.
There had been 15 patients in the hospital at the time of the attack, all of whom were transferred elsewhere, he said.
Dust covered hospital beds, incubators were broken, and the floor was scattered with rubble. Water from a broken tank had gathered on the hospital floor, mixing with patches of blood.
Dr Younes said 90 per cent of patients received by the hospital were civilians who needed treatment either for shrapnel or bullet wounds. 'The actual team of doctors who worked at this hospital have all left and they've been replaced by us, volunteers,' he said.
Citing hospital staff interviewed at the scene, Human Rights Watch said no opposition fighters had been deployed at the hospital at the time of two attacks that had targeted it on August 12 and August 14, and only several armed hospital guards were providing security.
'On the fourth floor of the hospital, Human Rights Watch saw the tail remnants from about a dozen S-5 rockets. These rockets are fired from aircraft with a range of two to three miles,' it said in a statement.
The Russian-made S-5 is an unguided rocket originally developed in the 1950s. Though still in production, it is not noted for its accuracy.

Black smoke billows from the scene outside a Damascus hotel where U.N. observers are staying

War-torn: A Syrian soldier investigates the scene after the explosion

Damascus has been hit by a wave of explosions in the past months and clashes between government troops and rebels

'All hospitals, whether civilian or military, are specially protected under international humanitarian law, known as the laws of war. They may not be targeted, even if being used to treat enemy fighters,' Human Rights Watch said.
Under the Geneva Conventions hospitals remain protected unless they are 'used to commit hostile acts' that are outside their humanitarian function, it added.
'Hospitals, doctors, and ambulances should never be attacked,' said Ole Solvang, emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch. 'In Aleppo, the Syrian government has flouted this principle of international law.' 
In the capital Damascus, Syria's state TV reported today that a bomb attached to a fuel truck has exploded outside a hotel where UN observers are staying in the Syrian capital, wounding at least three people.
The station said the explosion took place near a parking lot used by the army command, which is about 300 yards away. None of the wounded were believed to be UN staff.

But according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene, the blast had gone off inside a different parking lot belonging to a military compound near the Dama Rose Hotel, popular with the UN observers in Syria.
The hotel was slightly damaged in the blast, with some of its windows shattered. A Labour Union building across from the hotel was also damaged and black smoke was seen billowing into the sky before the fire was extinguished. UN officials in Damascus had no immediate comment.

Damascus has been hit by a wave of explosions in the past months and clashes between government troops and rebels have also recently reached the capital, which had been relatively quiet since the uprising against President Assad's regime started in March last year.

Meanwhile, Iran is playing a growing role supporting the Syrian regime and is helping to build and train a militia to fight opposition forces, U.S. defence chiefs have said.
General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Pentagon reporters that the militia, generally made up of Syrian Shiite forces, was being used to take the pressure off the Syrian regime forces.
'Any army would be taxed with that kind of pace,' Gen Dempsey said. 'They are having resupply problems, they are having morale problems, they are having the kind of wear and tear that would come of being in a fight for as long as they have.'

Gen Dempsey also said that it appeared Syrian rebels were able to shoot down a warplane, but said he had seen no indication that they were yet armed with heavy weapons or surface-to-air missiles.
He said the MiG fighter could have been shot down with small arms fire. Syria has blamed the crash on a technical malfunction, but Gen Dempsey said the cause 'didn't appear to be mechanical'.

Gen Dempsey and defence secretary Leon Panetta voiced concerns about Iran's growing presence in Syria, even as President Assad's regime steps up its aerial attacks against the rebel forces.