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| Syrian forces arrest 200 in rebellious town, says lawyer Posted: 12 Apr 2011 05:18 PM PDT  A still image from amateur video posted on a social media website purportedly shows Syrian security forces dragging the body of an anti-government protester along a street. Video dated on April 8, 2011. — Reuters pic "They brought in a television crew and forced the men they arrested to shout 'We sacrifice our blood and our soul for you, Bashar' while filming them," the lawyer, who was in contact with residents in Baida, 10km south of the Mediterranean seaside city of Banias, told Reuters. The lawyer, who did not want to be further identified, said the events occurred yesterday. "Syria is the Arab police state par excellence. But the regime still watches international reaction, and as soon as it senses that it has weakened, it turns more bloody," the lawyer added. Assad, who tried to position Syria as self-declared champion of "resistance" to Israel while seeking peace with the Jewish state and accepting offers for rehabilitation in the West, has responded to the protests with a blend of force — his security forces have killed unarmed protesters — and promises of reform. But the mass public demands for freedom and an end to corruption, now in their fourth week, have yet to abate. Syrian secret police and soldiers surrounded Baida yesterday, and went into houses, arresting men up to 60 years old. Gunfire was heard earlier in the day and one man was killed, the activists said. They said Baida was targeted because its residents participated in a demonstration in Banias last week in which protesters shouted: "The people want the overthrow of the regime" — the rallying cry of the Tunisian and Egyptian revolts. One activist said some residents of Baida had weapons and it appeared that an armed confrontation had erupted. But Sheikh Anas Airout, an imam in nearby Banias, said Baida residents were largely unarmed and that they were paying the price for their non-violent quest for freedom. Irregular Assad loyalists, known as 'al-shabbiha', killed four people in Banias on Sunday, a human rights defender in the city said, raising tensions in the mostly Sunni Muslim country ruled by minority Alawites, adherents to an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Banias, home to one of Syria's two oil refineries, remained sealed off overnight and around 20 tanks were stationed near the northern and southern entrances of the city. The protests against 48 years of autocratic Baath Party rule erupted in the southern city of Deraa near the border with Jordan, expanding to the suburbs of the capital Damascus, the northeast, the coast and areas in between. Aleppo quiet But with heavy secret police presence and Assad maintaining backing from the Sunni merchant class and preachers on the state payroll, the protests have not spread to Damascus proper and to Syria's second city Aleppo. This has robbed the demonstrations of the critical mass they attained in Tunisia and Egypt. Authorities blame armed groups and "infiltrators" for the violence, in which they say civilians, soldiers and police also have been killed. Syria's main human rights movement said the death toll from pro-democracy protests had reached 200 and urged the Arab League to impose sanctions on the ruling hierarchy. "Syria's uprising is screaming with 200 martyrs, hundreds of injured and a similar number of arrests," the Damascus Declaration group said in a letter sent on Monday to the secretary general of the Arab League. — Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
| Libyan rebels repel twin government offensives in Misrata Posted: 12 Apr 2011 04:24 PM PDT  Libyan rebels prepare to fire rockets mounted on a truck by using a cable laid a distance away at the western gate of Ajdabiyah on April 12, 2011. — Reuters pic Misrata, along with other cities, rose up in revolt against Gaddafi's four-decade rule in mid-February and is the last big rebel stronghold in the west of the country. "There was heavy fighting in Tripoli Street and the rebels held their positions. Also, very intense fighting occurred on the eastern side of Misrata on the Nak el Theqeel road. The rebels repelled the attack," a rebel spokesman, who identified himself as Mohamad Abu Shaara told Reuters by telephone. Tripoli Street is a main thoroughfare that cuts through to the city centre from the western outskirts while the Nak el Theqeel road leads to Misrata's rebel-controlled port. A rebel spokesman called Abdelsalam quoted medics saying one rebel was killed. A resident called Ghassan said 12 people were killed in fighting in Misrata on Monday, including a young girl. "Medical workers today collected the bodies of 12 people, mainly civilians but rebel fighters as well, killed yesterday," he said by phone. "Most of the bodies were retrieved from the area of Tripoli Street. The dead included a three-year old girl who was shot dead by a sniper along with a 50-year-old man in the west of Misrata, medical workers told me." Libyan officials say they are fighting armed militia groups linked to al Qaeda who are bent on destabilising the north African country. It is difficult to verify reports from Misrata because journalists are prevented from reporting freely there. Western mountains Ghassan said some 1,000 people took to the streets of northern Misrata yesterday to show support for the rebels. "About 1,000 people held a peaceful protest close to the beach in the Kasir Ahmad area to express their support for the rebels and to reject the ceasefire proposal put forward by the African Union," he said. "Protesters held banners reading: "The blood of our martyrs will not be in vain" and "We stand strong". A rebel spokesman in the town of Zintan, also under attack by Gaddafi forces, said there had been a new bombardment. "The pro-Gaddafi forces located north of the town fired mortar rounds from pick-up trucks at Zintan. Fortunately only one person was wounded in the attack," the spokesman, called Abdulrahman, said by phone. "It's been mostly random firing as the town is perched 750 metres above sea level and the pro-Gaddafi forces are in the foothills of the mountains." Zintan is in the Western Mountains region, a sparsely populated area inhabited by ethnic Berbers, many of whom rose up against Gaddafi's rule. Residents of the region who fled to neighbouring Tunisia have told Reuters that government forces are waging a campaign of terror there, destroying homes, killing livestock and threatening to rape women The spokesman said Gaddafi's forces, unable to get into Zintan itself, were targeting people in nearby villages and rounding up anyone suspected of links to the rebels. "In the nearby hamlet of al-Ghnayma, the pro-Gaddafi forces have since Saturday been singling out civilians originating from Zintan," he said. "They have arrested 15 in total and released them later after finding out they had nothing to do with the rebels." "But they have, up to today, burned down the homes of about 40 to 50 families (originally) from Zintan who live in al-Ghnayma and have also been poisoning their water wells by pouring in fuel and ... engine oil." Zintan itself was suffering from an increasingly acute shortage of water, the spokesman said. "Zintan relies on water from the foothills of the mountains. But with the fuel shortage, tanker trucks cannot go there and even if they had fuel they'd run the risk of being attacked by Gaddafi forces controlling that position," Abdulrahman said. — Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
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