Syrian forces kill 15 protesters, activists say

Reuters – Newly arrived Syrian refugees walk to their tents in the Turkish border town of Reyhanli in Hatay province …

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis – 1 hr 19 mins ago

AMMAN (Reuters) – Syrian security forces shot dead at least 15 people on Friday after tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets demanding the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad, witnesses and activists said.

"Tell the world Bashar is without legitimacy," shouted several thousand protesters in the Damascus suburb of Irbin, the chants audible in a phone call to a witness at the protest.

The Local Coordination Committees, a main activists' group, said it had the names of 14 civilians killed in the merchant city of Homs, the impoverished town of Kiswa south of Damascus and in the residential district of Barzeh in the capital.

Another protester was shot dead in the town of Qusair, a rights group said.

Syrian state television blamed the killings in Barzeh on armed men who authorities say are behind the violence in the three-month uprising, and said members of security forces were wounded. Syria has expelled most foreign journalists making it hard to verify witness accounts or official statements.

The state news agency Sana said tens of thousands rallied in Damascus governorate in support of the "comprehensive reform process" led by Assad. It also reported a pro-Assad event in the eastern governorate of Deir al-Zor. The agency carried pictures of crowds carrying Syrian flags and pictures of Assad.

In Barzeh, a resident who gave his name only as Hussam, told Reuters by telephone: "The security police first used teargas then they started shooting from rooftops when shouting against Assad continued. Three youths were killed and I saw two bodies shot in the head and the chest."

In the central cities of Homs and Hama, protesters shouted "the people want the downfall of the regime," while in Deraa, cradle of the uprising, people waved banners rejecting Assad's promise in a speech this week to launch a national dialogue.

Deraa protesters chanted slogans urging people in Damascus, which has seen fewer demonstrations than rural protest centres, to follow their lead. "People of Damascus, here in Deraa we toppled the regime," they chanted.

Protests also erupted in western coastal cities and eastern provinces near Iraq. Syrian troops swept to the northern border with Turkey on Thursday, prompting another 1,500 refugees to flee across the frontier into camps which Turkish officials say now host more than 11,000 refugees.

Syrian television said on Friday army units were "completing their deployment" in border villages. It said there had been no casualties during the operation and that soldiers were greeted with traditional welcomes of flowers and rice by residents.

Assad's repression of the protests, in which Syrian rights groups say more than 1,300 civilians have been killed, has triggered Western condemnation and a gradual escalation of U.S. and European Union economic sanctions against Syrian leaders.

Syrian authorities blame Islamist militants and armed gangs for killing more than 200 police and security personnel.

On Friday the European Union announced extended sanctions against Syria, including against three commanders of Iran's Revolutionary Guard accused of helping Damascus curb dissent. Syria denies Iran has played any role in tackling the unrest.

Four Syrian officials were also targeted, bringing to 34 the number of individuals and entities on the list which already includes Assad and his top officials.

Despite strong rhetoric among against Assad from Western leaders, there has been no suggestion they plan to go beyond economic sanctions to tougher action such as the military intervention launched against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

WASHINGTON WORRIED

The United States, which has also imposed targeted sanctions on Syrian officials, said a reported Syrian army move to surround and target the town of Khirbat al-Joz just 500 metres (yards) from the Turkish border was a worrying development.

"Unless the Syrian forces immediately end their attacks and their provocations that are not only now affecting their own citizens but (raising) the potential of border clashes, then we're going to see an escalation of conflict in the area," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

The crackdown has caused a crisis in Assad's once-warm relations with Turkey, which has become strongly critical.

Clinton said she had discussed the situation with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, and President Barack Obama had discussed it with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.

Davutoglu, who said Erdogan would speak to Assad on Friday, talked to Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem on Thursday and Ankara summoned the Syrian ambassador.

In an apparent easing of Ankara's criticism, Davutoglu said Assad's speech contained "positive elements in it as signals of reform," but said it was important that action followed.

At the border, only a few Syrian troops were visible on Friday, some occupying a building on a hill overlooking the border, directly across from the Turkish village of Guvecci.

Three Syrian soldiers were manning a sand-bagged machinegun post on top of a house in the Syrian border village of Khirbat al-Joz. Camps on the Syrian side of the border fence appeared deserted and no more refugees were crossing.

The United States has steadily sharpened its rhetoric toward Assad, saying he is losing credibility and must either implement promised reforms or get out of the way.

Protests have grown in northern areas following military assaults on towns and villages in the Jisr al-Shughour region of Idlib province, west of Aleppo, that sent more than 10,000 people fleeing across the 840-km (520-mile) border with Turkey.

Syrian television said hundreds of people were heading back to Jisr al-Shughour. A refugee who said he was at Yayladagi camp said on Thursday a delegation of notables from the city told people it was safe to go back, but that refugees told them there would be "no return until the fall of the (Assad) regime."

Syria, a mostly Sunni nation of 20 million with Kurdish, Alawite and Christian minorities, is vulnerable to sectarian tensions. Assad belongs to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, and his opponents say he increasingly relies on loyalist Alawite troops and irregulars known as 'shabbiha'.

(Additional reporting by Omer Berberoglu and Umit Bektas in Guvecci, Turkey, Simon Cameron-Moore and Ibon Villelabeitia in Ankara, Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman, Andrew Quinn in Washington; Writing by Dominic Evans; Editing by Alistair Lyon)

Syrian forces round up hundreds near northwest town

– Bloody Crackdown In Syria

AP – In this citizen journalism image acquired by the AP, Syrian refugees are seen inside Syria, near the …

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis – 2 hrs 10 mins ago

AMMAN (Reuters) – Syrian troops rounded up hundreds of people in a sweep through villages near Jisr al-Shughour on Monday, fleeing residents said, after President Bashar al-Assad's army retook the rebellious northwestern town.

Nearly 7,000 Syrians have fled the region around Jisr al-Shughour, seeking sanctuary in neighboring Turkey, while thousands more are sheltering in rural areas just inside Syria, activists say.

Monday's wave of arrests followed an assault by troops, tanks and helicopters to regain control of the town, one week after authorities said 120 security personnel were killed there in fighting they blamed on "armed groups."

Some residents said those killed were soldiers who had mutinied, refusing to shoot protesters and joining demonstrators calling for an end to Assad's rule.

The town of 50,000, just 20 km (12 miles) south of the Turkish border, is the latest focus of a military crackdown on the protests which have swept Syria for nearly three months and continue despite the deaths of hundreds of civilians.

Refugees from Jisr al-Shughour said the military was combing villages to the east of the town and arresting hundreds of men between the ages of 18 and 40, in a pattern seen in other military crackdowns since the unrest started in March.

Residents said the army unit that took the town was commanded by Assad's brother Maher.

Ahmad Yassin, 27, said he left his 7,000 sq meter plot of land east of Jisr al-Shughour early on Monday when a force of 200 soldiers and men wearing black came in armored personnel carriers and cars and poured petrol on the wheat crops.

"I tried to save my three cows but there was no time. I put my wife and two children in the car and drove straight to the border," he said.

His account of troops setting fire to crops echoed reports from other refugees, but the official state news agency has accused "armed terrorist groups" of burning land as sabotage.

Syrian rights groups say 1,300 civilians have been killed since the start of the uprising. One group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, says more than 300 soldiers and police have also been killed.

Syria has banned most foreign correspondents, making it difficult to verify accounts of events.

ARMY TAKES CONTROL

The government says the protests are part of a violent conspiracy backed by foreign powers to sow sectarian strife.

Army units "have taken total control of Jisr al-Shughour and are chasing remnants of the armed terrorist gangs in the woods and mountains," the Syrian news agency said on Sunday.

It said a soldier and two armed men were killed in clashes around the town. The army defused explosives planted on bridges and roads and uncovered mass graves holding mostly mutilated bodies of 12 security men killed by armed groups, it said.

Thousands of people from Jisr al-Shughour, located on a vital road junction, had already fled to Turkey before Sunday's assault. Turkey has grown increasingly critical of Assad and has now set up four camps to accommodate refugees.

In a sign of tension between Syria and Turkey, which had close trade and political ties before the crisis, supporters of Assad protested outside Turkey's embassy in Damascus on Sunday.

Turkey's Anatolian news agency said some people climbed the embassy walls and hung a Syrian flag, and Syrian security forces prevented some protesters from trying to lower the Turkish flag.

A resident said the crowd then tore down tourist posters on the outside wall of the embassy.

France, with British support, has led efforts for the United Nations Security Council to condemn Assad's repression of the protests but Russia and China have suggested they may use their veto power to kill the resolution.

A spokesman for British Prime Minister David Cameron said newly re-elected Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan welcomed British efforts to put pressure on Assad at the United Nations.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has said Assad had lost the legitimacy to rule Syria.

The White House condemned the Syrian forces' latest violence in the "strongest possible terms" and said Assad should step aside if he will not lead a democratic transition.

Assad, who inherited power when his father died in 2000, has offered some moves aimed at appeasing protesters, lifting a 48-year state of emergency and promising a national dialogue -- steps which have been dismissed by many activists.

The privately owned Syrian newspaper Al-Watan said a committee formed to investigate the unrest had imposed a travel ban on the former governor of Deraa, where protests broke out on March 18, and its head of security. It said there would be "no immunity for people who committed crimes."

(Additional reporting by Alexandra Hudson in Guvecci, Turkey; Writing by Dominic Evans; editing by Tim Pearce)

Gunfire, explosions heard in besieged Syrian city

AP – A Syrian protester beats a poster of Syrian President Bashar Assad with a shoe, as he attends protest …

By BASSEM MROUE, Associated Press Bassem Mroue, Associated Press

BEIRUT – Gunfire and sporadic explosions were heard in a tense southern city Wednesday after the Syrian army sent in more tanks and reinforcements as part of a widening crackdown on the uprising against President Bashar Assad's authoritarian regime.

In addition to the unrest in Daraa — the city where the uprising began more than five weeks ago — security forces were conducting sweeping arrests and raids elsewhere in the country, witnesses said.

The crackdown came as opposition figures said their "massive grassroots revolution" will break the regime unless Assad leads a transition to democracy.

The statement from an umbrella group of opposition activists in Syria and abroad called the National Initiative for Change said a democratic transition will "safeguard the nation from falling into a period of violence, chaos and civil war."

"If the Syrian president does not wish to be recorded in history as a leader of this transition period, there is no alternative left for Syrians except to move forward along the same path as did the Tunisians, Egyptians and Libyans before them," the statement said.

But the relentless government throttling of the protest movement showed no signed of letting up.

A vigorous crackdown since mid-March has killed more than 400 people across Syria, with 120 dead just over the weekend. Yet the repression has only emboldened protesters who started their revolt with calls for modest reforms but are now increasingly demanding Assad's downfall.

Mustafa Osso, who cited eyewitnesses on the ground in the city Daraa, said new troops arrived early Wednesday from military bases in the area. Another rights activist, Ammar Qurabi, said security and armed forces have detained more than 400 people in Daraa since a major operation began in the city two days ago.

The opposition is getting more organized as the uprising gains momentum, but it is still largely a grassroots operation. There are no credible opposition leaders who have risen to the level of being considered as a possible successor to Assad.

The army sent tanks into Daraa, 80 miles (130 kilometers) south of Damascus, on Monday and there have been reports of shooting and raids there and in areas across the country ever since. Daraa is where the uprising began last month.

On Wednesday, witnesses and human rights activists said the army also deployed tanks around the Damascus suburb of Douma and the coastal city of Banias, where there have been large demonstrations in recent weeks.

One Douma resident said security agents were going house-to-house, carrying lists of wanted people and conducting raids. If the agents did not find the person they were looking for, they took his relatives into custody, the resident said.

Two funerals were planned Wednesday, he said.

In Banias, a witness said the army redeployed tanks and armored personnel carriers near the main highway leading into the city.

In the coastal city of Latakia, an activist said security forces fired live bullets and stun grenade at demonstrators in poor areas near the city's Palestinian refugee camp of al-Ramel. He said four people were wounded and several others were detained.

Residents contacted by the AP spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear for their safety.

Syria has banned nearly all foreign media and restricted access to trouble spots since the uprising began, making it almost impossible to verify the dramatic events shaking one of the most authoritarian regimes in the Arab world.

Amnesty International said the UN Security Council must refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court.

"The Syrian government is clearly trying to shatter the will of those peacefully expressing dissent by shelling them, firing on them and locking them up," said Salil Shetty, Amnesty International's Secretary General.