Syrian authorities have blamed armed gangs working for foreign governments for protests that started in mid-March against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
A Syrian opposition figure speaking to the German Press Agency DPA in Beirut on the condition of anonymity cast doubt on the official version that an armed gang carried out the attack near Homs, where the army and security presence has been heavy since Saturday.
“Who would have the courage to fire at the bus when there are hundreds of Syrian troops positioned in every street in Homs?” he asked.
He said that during the night, the military cut electricity and communications before deploying on every street in several districts of the western city in preparation for what he described as an “arrest operation.” “The authorities are searching for hundreds of people they want to arrest in Homs,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Rights groups have said more than 600 people have been killed and 8,000 jailed or gone missing in the crackdown on protesters since March. The Committee of the Martyrs of the 15 March Revolution said its tally of the dead was 708.
The Syrian government continues to crack-down on pro-reform protesters, with Monday's death toll reaching between 11 and 25 people during a demonstration in Daraa, according to varying reports.
Thousands of soldiers backed by tanks poured Monday into the city where the five-week-old uprising began, opening fire indiscriminately on civilians before dawn and killing at least 11 people, witnesses said.
The offensive was planned in detail with electricity, water and mobile phone services cut off and knife-wielding security agents conducting house-to-house sweeps.
Witnesses said busloads of troops poured in before dawn and snipers took up positions on the roofs of houses and high buildings while other security agents searched houses for suspected protesters.
"We need international intervention. We need countries to help us," a witness in Daraa told the Associated Press on the phone, adding that he saw five corpses after security forces opened fire on a car.
Watch tanks shoot at civilians in Daraa
"Let Obama come and take Syria. Let Israel come and take Syria. Let the Jews come – anything is better than Bashar Assad," he said, playing on Syria's hatred for Israel to highlight how much town residents despise their leader.
Meanwhile, the White House stepped up its condemnation of President Bashar Assad's regime, but stopped well short of demanding the ouster of a leader some US Democrats had considered a potential reformer and peace broker.
The US State Department on Monday told American citizens to leave Syria as soon as they can and ordered some personnel at the US Embassy in Damascus to depart the country.
Ten Syrian security personnel and two gunmen were killed in clashes in the coastal city of Latakia during the past two days, the state-run news agency said, as unrest persisted.
Another 200 people were injured, the Syrian Arab News Agency reported.
Syrian forces have fought protesters in several cities after President Bashar Al-Assad’s promises of more freedoms and pay increases failed to prevent unrest from spreading. Demonstrations that started earlier this month may have led to the deaths of 55 people, London-based Amnesty International said in a statement on its website.
Syria is the latest country in the region to be hit by the wave of uprisings that ousted longtime rulers in Egypt and Tunisia, and sparked armed conflict in Libya. Assad’s regime is an ally of Iran and a power broker in neighboring Lebanon, where it supports the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah movement.
“We’re very concerned about Syria,” U.K. Defence Secretary Liam Fox told the BBC’s “Andrew Marr Show” from Brussels, where he was attending a summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. “The position on the ground seems to be deteriorating. There needs to be international pressure. You cannot simply shoot people who have a different point of view.”
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the U.S. won’t enter into the internal conflict in Syria the way it has in Libya.
International Intervention
Clinton said the elements that led to international intervention in Libya -- international condemnation, an Arab League call for action, a United Nations Security Council resolution -- are “not going to happen” with Syria, in part because members of the U.S. Congress from both parties say they believe Assad is “a reformer.”
The U.S. and allies such as France and the U.K. are enforcing a United Nations mandate to protect Libyan civilians and have been carrying out airstrikes against Libya’s air force and troops loyal to leader Muammar Qaddafi. International leaders have also called for Qaddafi’s ouster.
Syria has decided to end the state of emergency that was imposed in 1963 at a date that has yet to be determined, Agence France-Presse reported today, citing President Assad’s adviser Buthaina Shaaban.
Shaaban on March 24 said protesters’ demands were “legitimate” and would be met “but in a calm way.”
Foreign Reserves
Central Bank Governor Adib Mayaleh said foreign reserves at the bank are enough to keep the pound’s exchange rate stable and meet local demand, SANA said.
Syrian army vehicles entered Latakia, Al Arabiya reported yesterday, citing unidentified witnesses. Khalid Kamal, an imam in the port city, said in a phone interview with Al Jazeera that “military police and unknown snipers opened fire randomly on protesters.”
Video footage on the Internet broadcast by pan-Arab news networks Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya yesterday showed hundreds of protesters in cities including Homs and Daraa. SANA said an armed group killed one man in Homs while another group in Sanamein attacked security forces, who killed several assailants.
Shaaban said the government planned moves to combat corruption, a new media law guaranteeing more freedom, improving living standards for residents of border areas, and changes to criminal law to ban random arrests and speed the processing of cases.
Assad has already ordered pay increases of between 20 percent and 30 percent for state employees and an income-tax cut, state television reported. He also ordered a 25 percent increase in the pensions of former government employees.
Assad’s father, the late President Hafez Assad, ruled the Arab country for 29 years. In 1982, he crushed a rebellion led by Islamist militants in the city of Hama, killing as many as 10,000 people, according to estimates cited by Human Rights Watch.
