2 killed as Syrian forces hunt for defector

Syrian security forces searching for an alleged high-profile defector from President Bashar Assad’s regime killed two people after storming a northern village yesterday, raising the death toll from the past two days to at least 19, activists said.

A day earlier, security forces trying to crush almost six months of demonstrations against the authoritarian

leadership fired on thousands of marchers, killing 17 people, most of them in suburbs of the capital Damascus.

The crackdown has drawn international criticism and sanctions. The European Union announced Friday that it was banning oil imports from Syria, which will cost the embattled regime millions of dollars each day.

While Assad brushed off earlier condemnation as foreign meddling, the oil embargo is significant because Damascus gets about 28 percent of its revenue from the oil trade and sells fuel to France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands. Some analysts believe Syria is getting financial assistance from Iran, which would cushion the EU blow.

The EU will do more, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, said yesterday after meetings in Poland with top diplomats of member states. Ashton told reporters in Poland the ban on Syrian oil imports was an attempt to achieve a political outcome by economic means.

“And we will continue to put that pressure on, to look for ways of doing so, to try and support the people,’’ she said.

The United States has hit more than 30 Syrian officials, including Assad himself, with economic sanctions, banned any US import of Syrian oil or petroleum products, and frozen all Syrian government assets subject to American jurisdiction. But the United States has isolated Syria for decades and has little leverage with the regime.

Yesterday, US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland welcomed the EU oil import ban.

“The United States and our international partners will continue to add political and economic pressure in an effort to force President Assad to step aside and allow the Syrian people to effect a peaceful transition,’’ Nuland said.

The United Nations says some 2,200 people have been killed since March as protesters take to the streets every week, despite the near-certainty that they will face bullets and sniper fire. The regime is in no imminent danger of collapse, leading to concerns that violence will escalate.

In the Damascus suburb of Douma yesterday, thousands of mourners marched behind the body of a man killed by gunfire Friday. Mourners seen on video posted online by residents shouted “freedom’’ and “God is great.’’

Activists said troops yesterday raided a village near the town of Maaret al-Numan in the province of Idlib, killing two people.

The Local Coordination Committees activist network and the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the deaths.

The Observatory cited a local activist saying troops taking part in yesterday’s raid in Idlib, an area close to the Turkish border, were searching for Adnan Bakkour, attorney general for the central Hama Province, who appeared in two videos Wednesday declaring his resignation.

Bakkour’s alleged resignation appeared to be a high-profile defection, but authorities said that terrorists had kidnapped him and forced him to make the recording. Bakkour denied that in one of the videos.

Crackdown escalates in east Syria, protesters killed

Syrian forces shot dead two pro-democracy protesters on Thursday in eastern provincial capital Deir al-Zoran, residents said, as a crackdown escalated against dissent in the tribal region bordering Iraq's Sunni heartland.

Military intelligence agents also injured seven protesters who had gathered in the main square of the city on the Euphrates river to protest against President Bashar al-Assad whose family has ruled Syria with an iron fist since 1970.
Ultra-loyalist army units also expanded a campaign to crush dissent in the northwestern province of Idlib bordering Turkey and in the city of Homs, where residents said two civilians were killed when security forces stormed the Bab Sebaa neighborhood.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said one soldier was also killed in the attack on the main residential district.
"A crowd of 1,500 had shown up for the usual noon demonstration despite the intense heat. Thousands more have descended on the square after the killings, and there are now around 10,000 people there," said one witness, a computer programer who declined to give his name for fear of arrest.
Despite being the center of Syria's modest oil production, Deir is among the poorest regions in the country of 20 million people.
The desert area has suffered water shortages for six years which experts say have been caused largely by mismanagement and corruption, and have decimated agricultural production.
Syrian authorities have allowed Sunni tribes in Deir al-Zor to carry arms against the threat seen posed by a Kurdish population further north.
MINORITY RULE
Assad, from Syria's Alawite minority sect, an offshoot of Islam, is struggling to put down spreading protests in rural and tribal regions, in suburbs of the capital and in cities such as Hama and Homs -- all demanding an end to his autocratic rule.
Mass arrests and the heavy deployment of security forces, including an irregular Alawite militia known as shabbiha, have prevented protests in central Damascus and the commercial hub of Aleppo.
Four villagers were killed on Wednesday in tank-backed assaults on at least four villages in the Jabal al-Zawya region in Idlib, activists said.
"We are seeing a military escalation following the regime's political escalation," said an activist in Idlib, referring to the thousands of arrests in a crackdown that has intensified in the last two weeks, according to human rights campaigners.
Among those arrested was physician Ahmad Tuma, a respected opposition leader from Deir, who was abducted from his clinic by Military Intelligence agents last week, his friends said.
Security forces arrested at least 30 people on Wednesday, including prominent film directors Nabil Maleh and Mohammad Malas, known for works chronicling malaise under Assad family rule, and actress May Skaf, during a pro-democracy protest in Damascus, rights organizations said.
They were among a group of artists who issued a declaration this week denouncing state violence against protesters and demanding accountability for the killings of civilians and the release of thousands of political prisoners held without trial.
International powers, including Turkey, have cautioned Assad against a repeat of massacres from the era of his father, the late President Hafez al-Assad, who crushed leftist and Islamist challenges to his rule, culminating in the killing of up to 30,000 people in the city of Hama in 1982.
The U.S. and French ambassadors visited Hama in a show of support last Friday. Three days later their embassies were attacked by Assad loyalists. No one was killed in the attacks which were condemned by the United Nations Security Council.

White House, in Shift, Turns Against Syria Leader

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, after weeks of urging Syria to carry out democratic reforms and end a brutal crackdown, has now turned decisively against President Bashar al-Assad, saying that he has lost legitimacy and that it has no interest in Mr. Assad keeping his grip on power.

President Obama, in an interview Tuesday with the “CBS Evening News,” stopped short of demanding that Mr. Assad step down. But administration officials said the president may take that step in coming days, as he did with Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, much earlier in that country’s popular uprising.
Mr. Obama’s comments, and even stronger ones by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday, showed that the administration has now concluded that Mr. Assad is no more willing or capable than Colonel Qaddafi of opening a dialogue with protesters or overseeing a political transformation.
The turning point in the administration’s public posture came after angry crowds attacked and vandalized the United States Embassy in Damascus, and the residence of Ambassador Robert Ford, after his visit to Hama, the hub of the current protests and site of a bloody crackdown by Mr. Assad’s father in 1982.
But administration officials said the shift has been weeks in the making, as Mr. Assad’s government has continued to harass and jail demonstrators, quash peaceful protests, and clamp down attempts to organize a political opposition. The crackdown has also begun to threaten regional stability with thousands of Syrian refugees fleeing across the northern border into Turkey.
“You’re seeing President Assad lose legitimacy in the eyes of his people,” Mr. Obama said to the CBS anchor, Scott Pelley. “He has missed opportunity after opportunity to present a genuine reform agenda. And that’s why we’ve been working at an international level to make sure we keep the pressure up.”
On Monday, Mrs. Clinton said, “If anyone, including President Assad, thinks the United States is secretly hoping that the regime will emerge from the turmoil to continue its brutality and repression, they are wrong. President Assad is not indispensable, and we have absolutely nothing invested in him remaining in power.”
Mrs. Clinton’s comments seemed calculated to answer critics who pointed to the striking difference in how the administration responded to Libya and Syria — and contended that it has acted too gingerly toward Mr. Assad, fearing that his downfall would destabilize other countries in its neighborhood.
Administration officials said they had no choice in Libya: Colonel Qaddafi is notoriously unpredictable, and had threatened to send his troops house-to-house in Benghazi, killing his opponents. In Syria’s case, there is no military remedy. NATO nations have no interest in acting in Syria, and there is no chance of a United Nations Security Council resolution equivalent to the one that NATO is enforcing in Libya. Russia has made clear it would reject any resolution condemning Mr. Assad.
Unlike Libya, Syria is a force in the region, one that the administration once thought could be drawn away from Iran’s orbit and play a part in an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord. Some critics, however, have always contended that it was naïve to assume that the Assad government could be a force for peace.
Still, until recently some American officials argued they were better off with Mr. Assad in power than with a power vacuum that could threaten the stability of Lebanon and security of Israel, and might be filled by Iran. But now that Mr. Assad “has shown definitively he has no interest in reform,” one senior official said, “the rationale for holding on to him has evaporated.”
The United States, officials said, is readying fresh sanctions against senior members of the Assad regime, and is weighing sanctions on Syria’s oil and gas industry. It is also watching a meeting of opposition groups set for this Saturday, which officials said could offer hope that the opposition — disorganized and lacking in leaders after decades of repression — is developing a viable transition plan.
Mr. Assad, officials cautioned, was far from being toppled. On any given day, they said, his government or the opposition holds the upper hand. But the upheaval has badly damaged Syria’s economy. For the first time, a senior official said, “the government has admitted that this is a crisis.”
“What led Washington, as well as the Turks and the Europeans to change their minds, was Assad’s complete lack of reliability,” said Andrew Tabler, an expert on Syria at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “He promised not to use live fire against protesters, and the next day, he used live fire.”
While Mr. Tabler said the Assad regime was “degrading and disintegrating,” he added, “most people believe this is going to take a long time.”
Marshaling action against Syria’s oil and gas industry is complicated, Mr. Tabler said, because European and Canadian companies have investments there. The United States also has to worry about Arab neighbors like Saudi Arabia or Kuwait trying to throw Mr. Assad a financial lifeline in the name of regional stability.
The United States has tried to bring other forms of pressure to bear. It leaned on the International Atomic Energy Agency to refer to the United Nations a finding that the Syrian government sought to build a secret nuclear reactor, which was destroyed by Israel in a nighttime raid in September 2007. Mr. Assad has denied the facility had any nuclear use; the atomic energy agency concluded differently. The reactor was built, intelligence officials say, with secret aid from North Korea.
The mob attack on the United States Embassy and residence, as well as a similar assault on the French Embassy, brought a statement of condemnation from the United Nations Security Council. But the unanimity required of the 15 council members has proved harder to muster for any stronger action.
Administration officials said Mr. Ford’s visit to Hama, where he was met by welcoming crowds, showed the value of sending an envoy to Syria — something members of Congress have criticized. While the officials said they could not prove Mr. Ford’s presence there averted a violent assault by security forces, one said: “It’s very possible. A lot of people were expecting Hama to be very ugly.”

Syria: US condemns 'brutality and violence'

The US has strongly condemned Syria's "outrageous use of violence" against anti-government protesters. 

The White House said the government was leading Syria down a "dangerous path" and called for "an immediate end to the brutality and violence". At least 28 people were killed in fresh clashes in Idlib province on Friday. The violence came as government forces moved on the town of Jisr al-Shughour where the government said 120 security personnel had been killed. Hundreds of civilians have fled north into Turkey to escape the assault. 

 Assad 'unavailable'

In a statement, White House spokesman Jay Carney repeated calls for the Syrian security forces to exercise restraint, and said the US stood by those Syrians who were "demanding dignity and the transition to democracy that they deserve". "The Syrian government is leading Syria on a dangerous path," he said. "For that reason, it is critical that all Syrians remain united, work to prevent sectarian conflict, and pursue their aspirations peacefully." UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also expressed concern over the high civilian toll, describing the use of military force as "unacceptable". A spokesman for Mr Ban said he was "keen to speak to" Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but that the president has repeatedly been "unavailable" in recent days. Syria has prevented foreign journalists, including those from the BBC, from entering the country, making it difficult to independently verify reports from there. But anti-government activists said about 15 people died in the northern province of Idlib on Friday, most of them in Maarat al-Numan where tanks and helicopters fired on protesters who had taken to the streets after prayers. Correspondents say it is the first reported use of air power to quell protests in Syria's three-month uprising. A Syrian opposition figure told the Associated Press news agency by telephone that thousands of protesters had overwhelmed security officers and set light to a courthouse and a police station in the town. State TV reported that armed gangs had attacked police stations in the town. Another five anti-government protesters were killed in the coastal city of Latakia, according to activist sources. Two people were reported killed by security forces in Busra al-Harir, southern Deraa province, and another four in the Qaboun district of the capital, Damascus. Jisr al-Shughour was said to be all but deserted as troops moved in on Friday, reportedly bulldozing homes and torching crops and fields on their way. Opposition activists earlier told the BBC that the army was adopting a "scorched earth policy" around the town. The Syrian government has not commented on the claim. "They said they even killed animals," one man who had fled Jisr al-Shughour told AP. "The people have no weapons, they can't defend themselves. The only thing they can do is escape." Witnesses reported explosions coming from near the town and helicopter gunships and tanks were said to be opening fire. The crackdown in Jisr al-Shughour had been long expected after the government blamed armed groups for the deaths of 120 security personnel in the town earlier in the week. Some reports suggested there had been a mutiny among security forces. State TV has been broadcasting images of what it says are soldiers and police shot dead in the town. Officials say local people requested military intervention to restore order. Since March, mass protests against the rule of President Assad have become a regular event following Friday prayers. Human rights groups say more than 1,300 people have died as the government tries to suppress dissent, most of them unarmed civilians. The government rejects the figures and says about 500 security forces have died. With the unrest showing no sign of abating, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) called for immediate access to those affected by the violence and those arrested or detained. Turkey - which shares a long border with northern Syria - says more than 2,000 Syrians have crossed over, seeking refuge from the expected retaliation on Jisr al-Shughour. The city has a population of about 50,000. It is not clear how many other residents have fled to other locations within Syria. Are you in Syria?

Have you travelled from Syria to Turkey to flee the situation there? Send us your comments and experiences.

Ten Syrians killed in bus ambush

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.

'Let Israel come and take Syria'

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.

Reports: Syrian Forces Kill 8 Mourners Attending Funerals

Witnesses say Syrian security forces and snipers have opened fire on mourners attending mass funerals on Saturday, killing at least eight people.

Rights groups and witnesses say Saturday's shootings took place in the Damascus suburb of Douma and southern town of Izraa. Thousands of people had gathered at the locations to pay their last respects to some of the 75 people reported killed on Friday after witnesses said security forces fired shots and tear gas at anti-government demonstrators.

Some mourners chanted anti-government slogans and renewed their calls for President Bashar al-Assad's immediate resignation.

Meanwhile, two Syrian parliament members have announced they are resigning in protest against the killings of civilians.

World powers have criticized the Syrian government's crackdown on opposition activists on Friday which was the deadliest day since anti-government unrest erupted in March.

On Saturday, the Syrian government responded to criticism made Friday by U.S. President Barack Obama. Obama condemned what he called an "outrageous use of violence" and accused Assad of seeking Iranian assistance in the brutal crackdown.

Syria's state-run SANA news quotes an official as saying Obama's statement is not based on an "objective" view of what's happening in the country. The official also said U.S. claims of Iranian assistance in Syria show a "lack of responsibility" that could put Syrian citizens at risk.

Also on Saturday, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying Moscow still considered Syria a "friend," but was "firmly convinced" that only constructive dialogue and accelerated reforms would bring stability to the country.

Also, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called for an immediate stop to the crackdown in Syria.

Friday's deadly crackdown came one day after President Assad had signed a decree ending almost 50 years of emergency rule. The decree was part of his effort to end anti-government unrest by meeting some of the demands of protesters.

Twelve Killed in Syrian City in Clashes With Security Forces

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.

--Editors: Louis Meixler, Digby Lidstone.