After a days-long siege, Syrian troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships seized control early yesterday of another northwestern town, activists reported, as fresh accounts emerged of indiscriminate killing and summary executions in the Damascus regime’s suppression of a pro-democracy movement.
Elsewhere in Syria, thousands of people took to the streets again after the opposition called for a day of massive demonstrations, pressing on with their three-month-old campaign to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Troops in large numbers poured into Maaret al-Numan, 45km from the Turkish border, Syria-based rights activist Mustafa Osso said. He said other forces were now massing around Khan Sheikhon, to the south, where gunmen attacked army forces earlier this month.
Photo: Reuters
Omar Idilbi of the Local Coordination Committees (LCC), which is documenting the protests, said government forces had taken full control of Maaret al-Numan, a town of 100,000 on the highway linking Damascus with Syria’s second-largest city, Aleppo. Many of its residents had fled as troops swept through Idlib Governorate in recent days.
The deployment marks a continuation of military operations against centers of protest in the northern province, where forces have targeted Ariha, Maaret al-Numan, Jisr al-Shughur and its surroundings.
Witnesses said at the Turkish-Syrian border that Shughur al--Kadima was one of the villages that came under attack on Thursday.
“The army came ... with tanks and positioned snipers in the area. They started shooting at anyone,” said Abu Nuuar, a driver from Shughur al-Kadima.
“We left with nothing, absolutely nothing. We just took some clothes for the children,” said 32-year-old Abu Ahmed, declining to give his surname.
He arrived at the border from Shughur al-Kadima with his six children, wife and sister’s family after a dawn army crackdown.
“The army shot randomly with tanks and light weaponry. We walked through mountains and valleys and arrived here,” he said from across the border as his children gathered around him.
Meanwhile yesterday, about 2,000 protesters marched in the northeast towns of Amouda and Qamishli shortly after Friday prayers ended, chanting for the regime’s downfall, the LCC said.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Ankara would supply humanitarian aid to thousands of Syrian refugees fleeing the violence.
“There are at present more than 10,000 people just over our border, on the other side of the barbed wire,” he told journalists.
“We have decided to help our Syrian brothers to meet their urgent needs for food,” Davutoglu said a day after visiting refugee camps set up by the Red Crescent in Hatay Province, adding the Syrian authorities had been informed.
In what is seen as an attempt by the authorities to defuse some of the anti-government anger, telecoms tycoon Rami Makhluf, Assad’s cousin who is on a list of 13 Syrians facing EU sanctions, said he would allocate profits from his businesses to charity.
“Profits from the shares I own in Syriatel will be allocated to charity, humanitarian work and development projects” for people across Syria, Makhluf said in a statement obtained by AFP.
The statement said Makhluf owns 40 percent of Syriatel, the country’s largest mobile phone operator.
“I will not engage in any new projects that can generate personal gain and I will devote myself to charity and humanitarian work,” Makhluf said in the statement.
He said he took this decision because he no longer wants “to be a burden on Syria, its people and its president from now on.”
Makhluf is widely despised by opponents for allegedly exploiting his relationship with the president to build his commercial empire, including Syriatel.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Tuesday said the violence has claimed the lives of 1,297 civilians and 340 security force members since it began in mid-March.
Washington again urged on Thursday an end to the “revolting” crackdown and said it stepped up contacts with Syrians who seek political change, and working with its allies to isolate the regime.
“We are also beginning now to increase our own contacts with those brave Syrians who stand for change and their universal rights, those inside Syria and those outside Syria,” US Department of State spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
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