Frisian
11-05-2011, 11:13
Syrian tanks 'shell district of Homs'
Neighbourhood in restive city "shaking" with explosions from shelling and gunfire, according to rights campaigner.
Last Modified: 11 May 2011 08:33
Army tanks have shelled a residential district in Homs, according to a rights campaigner in the Syrian city which has emerged as the most populous centre of defiance against Bashar al-Assad's rule.
"Homs is shaking with the sound of explosions from tank shelling and heavy machine guns in the Bab Amro neighbourhood," Najati Tayara, said.
Assad initially responded to the unrest, the most serious challenge to his 11-year grip on power, with promises of reform.
He granted citizenship to stateless Kurds and last month lifted a 48-year state of emergency.
But he also deployed the army to crush dissent, in Deraa, where demonstrations first erupted on March 18, and then in other cities, making clear he would not risk losing the tight control his family has held over Syria for the past 41 years.
Live Blog Syria
Speaking to the New York Times, a powerful cousin of the president said the Assad family was not going to capitulate.
"We will sit here. We call it a fight until the end...They should know when we suffer, we will not suffer alone," Rami Makhlouf told the newspaper.
Makhlouf, a tycoon in his early 40s who owns several monopolies, and his brother, a secret police chief, have been under specific US sanctions since 2007 for corruption.
Suhair al-Atassi, a rights campaigner, said a demonstration broke out on Tuesday in Homs, despite a heavy security presence, after tanks stormed several neighbourhoods on Sunday and three civilians were killed.
"This regime is playing a losing card by sending tanks into cities and besieging them. Syrians have seen the blood of their compatriots spilt. They will never return to being non-persons," she told Reuters.
Demonstrators have shouted the name of Makhlouf as a symbol of graft in a country that has been facing severe water shortages and unemployment ranging from government estimates of 10 per cent to independent estimates of 25 per cent.
Makhlouf maintains he is a businessman whose companies provide jobs for thousands of Syrians.
Most foreign journalists have been banned from Syria.
Presidential adviser Bouthaina Shaaban told a New York Times correspondent allowed into the country for a few hours that the government was close to re-establishing order after unrest it blames on "armed terrorist groups".
"Now we've passed the most dangerous moment... I hope we are witnessing the end of the story." Shaaban said.
Erdogan posters in Baniyas
Security forces have released 300 people detained in Baniyas and restored basic services in the coastal city stormed by tanks and troops last week, according to a human rights group.
Water, telecommunications and electricity had been restored, but tanks remained in major streets, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday.
Two hundred people, including pro-democracy protest leaders were still in jail, it said.
"Scores of those released were severely beaten and subjected to insults. A tank deployed in the square where demonstrations were being held," Rami Abdelrahman, the Observatory director, said.
Human rights campaigners said at least six civilians, including four women, where killed in raids on Sunni neighbourhoods and in an attack on an all-women demonstration just outside Baniyas on Saturday.
Until the uprising began, Assad - from the minority Shia Alawite sect - had been emerging from Western isolation after defying the United States over Iraq and reinforcing an anti-Israel bloc with Iran, increasing Syrian Sunni concerns.
Demonstrators in Baniyas had raised posters of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, who has had close ties to Assad, but has disputed the official Syrian account of the violence.
Erdogan said more than 1,000 civilians had died, and he did not want to see a repeat of the 1982 Hama violence or the 1988 gassing of Iraqi Kurds in Halabja, when 5,000 people died.
In southern Syria, four civilians in Tafas were killed as security forces widened a campaign of arrests, a human rights campaigner in the region said, adding that 300 people had been detained since tanks entered the town on Saturday.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/05/20115117374683547.html
Neighbourhood in restive city "shaking" with explosions from shelling and gunfire, according to rights campaigner.
Last Modified: 11 May 2011 08:33
Army tanks have shelled a residential district in Homs, according to a rights campaigner in the Syrian city which has emerged as the most populous centre of defiance against Bashar al-Assad's rule.
"Homs is shaking with the sound of explosions from tank shelling and heavy machine guns in the Bab Amro neighbourhood," Najati Tayara, said.
Assad initially responded to the unrest, the most serious challenge to his 11-year grip on power, with promises of reform.
He granted citizenship to stateless Kurds and last month lifted a 48-year state of emergency.
But he also deployed the army to crush dissent, in Deraa, where demonstrations first erupted on March 18, and then in other cities, making clear he would not risk losing the tight control his family has held over Syria for the past 41 years.
Live Blog Syria
Speaking to the New York Times, a powerful cousin of the president said the Assad family was not going to capitulate.
"We will sit here. We call it a fight until the end...They should know when we suffer, we will not suffer alone," Rami Makhlouf told the newspaper.
Makhlouf, a tycoon in his early 40s who owns several monopolies, and his brother, a secret police chief, have been under specific US sanctions since 2007 for corruption.
Suhair al-Atassi, a rights campaigner, said a demonstration broke out on Tuesday in Homs, despite a heavy security presence, after tanks stormed several neighbourhoods on Sunday and three civilians were killed.
"This regime is playing a losing card by sending tanks into cities and besieging them. Syrians have seen the blood of their compatriots spilt. They will never return to being non-persons," she told Reuters.
Demonstrators have shouted the name of Makhlouf as a symbol of graft in a country that has been facing severe water shortages and unemployment ranging from government estimates of 10 per cent to independent estimates of 25 per cent.
Makhlouf maintains he is a businessman whose companies provide jobs for thousands of Syrians.
Most foreign journalists have been banned from Syria.
Presidential adviser Bouthaina Shaaban told a New York Times correspondent allowed into the country for a few hours that the government was close to re-establishing order after unrest it blames on "armed terrorist groups".
"Now we've passed the most dangerous moment... I hope we are witnessing the end of the story." Shaaban said.
Erdogan posters in Baniyas
Security forces have released 300 people detained in Baniyas and restored basic services in the coastal city stormed by tanks and troops last week, according to a human rights group.
Water, telecommunications and electricity had been restored, but tanks remained in major streets, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday.
Two hundred people, including pro-democracy protest leaders were still in jail, it said.
"Scores of those released were severely beaten and subjected to insults. A tank deployed in the square where demonstrations were being held," Rami Abdelrahman, the Observatory director, said.
Human rights campaigners said at least six civilians, including four women, where killed in raids on Sunni neighbourhoods and in an attack on an all-women demonstration just outside Baniyas on Saturday.
Until the uprising began, Assad - from the minority Shia Alawite sect - had been emerging from Western isolation after defying the United States over Iraq and reinforcing an anti-Israel bloc with Iran, increasing Syrian Sunni concerns.
Demonstrators in Baniyas had raised posters of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, who has had close ties to Assad, but has disputed the official Syrian account of the violence.
Erdogan said more than 1,000 civilians had died, and he did not want to see a repeat of the 1982 Hama violence or the 1988 gassing of Iraqi Kurds in Halabja, when 5,000 people died.
In southern Syria, four civilians in Tafas were killed as security forces widened a campaign of arrests, a human rights campaigner in the region said, adding that 300 people had been detained since tanks entered the town on Saturday.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/05/20115117374683547.html