Sun, Jun 19, 2011 page6

• Syrian forces slay 19 in biggest protests: activists

  INTENSIFYING: Protests have grown so much across the country since erupting in March that tensions spilled into neighboring Lebanon, where seven people died in clashes

  • Reuters and AFP, AMMAN; and TRIPOLI, LEBANON
  • • 
    • 
    • 

  Syrian forces shot dead at least 19 people on Friday when they fired at demonstrators demanding the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the biggest protest since unrest against Baathist rule erupted in March, activists said.

  European powers, which had initiated a detente with Assad prior to the street protests to try to draw the Syrian leader away from Iran and also stabilize Lebanon, said Damascus should face tougher sanctions for the violence.

  Tens of thousands of people rallied across the country, defying Assad’s military crackdown and ignoring a pledge that his tycoon cousin Rami Makhlouf, a symbol of corruption, would renounce his business empire and channel his wealth to charity.

  

  Men run for cover during clashes between sectarian factions near the Sunni Bab al-Tebbaneh neighborhood in Tripoli, Lebanon, on Friday.

  Photo: Reuters

  “Protests last week were big and this week they are bigger still. The demonstrators have not held squares consistently yet in big cities like we had seen in Egypt, but we’re heading in this direction,” opposition figure Walid al-Bunni told reporters by telephone from Damascus.

  “The security grip is weakening because the protests are growing in numbers and spreading and more people are risking their lives to demonstrate. The Syrian people realize that this is an opportunity for liberty that comes once in hundreds of years,” said Bunni, who was a political prisoner for eight years.

  The worst bloodshed was in Homs, a merchant city of 1 million people in central Syria, where the Local Coordination Committees, a main activist group linked to protesters, said 10 demonstrators were killed. State television said a policeman was killed by gunmen.

  One protester was also reported killed in the northern commercial hub of Aleppo, the first to die there in the unrest.

  The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which operates from Britain, said it could confirm only 10 civilians killed overall in Syria.

  The Syrian government has barred most international journalists from the country, making it difficult to verify accounts from activists and officials.

  Syrian authorities blame the violence on “armed terrorist groups” and Islamists, backed by foreign powers.

  Friday Muslim prayers have provided a platform for the biggest protests, inspired by revolts across the Arab world.

  Witnesses and activists said tens of thousands of people protested in the southern province of Daraa where the revolt began, as well as in the Kurdish northeast, the province of Deir al-Zor, which borders Iraq’s Sunni heartland, the city of Hama north of Damascus, the coast and suburbs of the capital itself.

  Two towns on the main Damascus-Aleppo highway north of Homs were also encircled by troops and tanks, residents said, five days after the army retook the town of Jisr al-Shughour, sending thousands feeling across the nearby border into Turkey.

  Refugees from the northwestern region said troops and gunmen loyal to Assad, known as shabbiha were pressing on with a scorched-earth campaign in the hill farm area by burning crops, ransacking houses and shooting randomly.

  The number of refugees who had crossed over from Syria has reached 9,600 and another 10,000 were sheltering by the border just inside Syria, according to Turkish officials.

  Syrian rights groups say at least 1,300 civilians have been killed and 10,000 people have been detained since March.

  The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said more than 300 soldiers and police have also been killed.

  Meanwhile, Lebanese oldiers deployed in force in Lebanon’s main northern city Tripoli yesterday after seven people were killed in clashes between Alawites and Sunnis over a rally against the Syrian government.

  Twenty-five people were also wounded in the fighting, which erupted hours after about 600 demonstrators gathered for a protest against Syria’s Alawite president Bashar, medics said.

  Troops deployed from 3am on the streets of the impoverished neighborhoods of Bab al-Tebbaneh and Jabal Mohsen, both of which sustained severe damage in the overnight clashes, an Agence France-Presse correspondent said.

  The two districts have been the scene of repeated clashes between the rival pro and anti-Syrian communities.

  Among those killed in the clashes, which involved automatic weapon and rocket-propelled grenade fire, were a Lebanese soldier, an official from an Alawite party and a 14-year-old Sunni boy.
• Most Popular

  • 1

    Taiwan places military on high alert

  • 2

    China warships near Taiwan nearly doubles

  • 3

    Flights arranged for Taiwanese stranded in Okinawa

  • 4

    Taiwan in Time: The Collector of historic buildings

  • 5

    Intel needs a core business strategy: Morris Chang