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62 Killed as Syrian Army Sends More Reinforcements to Idlib
 [An Nahar] Syrian security forces on Thursday killed 62 people across the country, monitors said, as the army sent further troop reinforcements to the northwestern province of Idlib, where activists said they fear an assault similar to the one that devastated the Baba Amr neighborhood of Homs.Fifty-two people were killed in the central province of Homs, including 44 who were summarily executed, two in Idlib province, two in the Damascus ...Capital of the last overtly fascist regime in the world... suburb of Daraya, three in the eastern province of Deir al-Zour, one in the central province of Hama, one in the southern province of Daraa and one in the northern province of Aleppo ...For centuries, Aleppo was Greater Syria's largest city and the Ottoman Empire's third, after Constantinople and Cairo. Although relatively close to Damascus in distance, Aleppans regard Damascenes as country cousins... , the LCC reported. For its part, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a little girl was killed by gunfire in the Idlib village of Khan Shaykhoun. Troops also rubbed out a man in the province's Jabal al-Zawiya hill district, the head of the Britannia-based watchdog, Rami Abdul Rahman, told Agence La Belle France Presse. Two civilians died in festivities in the town of al-Mayadin, in the eastern province of Deir al-Zour, and another died in Daraya village, in Damascus province, Abdul Rahman said. He said security forces were also carrying out raids and arrests in Deir al-Zour city. In the flashpoint central province of Hama, a 44-year-old man was rubbed out by a pro-regime militia in the village of Jarjara, Abdul Rahman added. In the capital, dozens of people were placed in long-term storage after a funeral turned into an anti-regime demonstration. "Security forces have placed in long-term storage dozens of people in the Mezzeh district of Damascus, who attended the funeral of a young man killed recently," the Observatory said. In the northern province of Aleppo, kabooms hit two security force buildings in the town of Aazaz which was heavily bombarded by troops on Wednesday, the Observatory said. An activist said the blasts were probably reprisal attacks by the rebel Free Syrian Army. Almost 8,500 people have died in the government's bloody crackdown on the revolt that erupted in Syria last March, most of them civilians, according to Observatory figures. Abdul Rahman said the troop buildup in Idlib appeared to indicate a major military operation was imminent given reports in the official press of "armed terrorist groups" in the region. Milad Fadl, a member of the opposition Syrian Revolution General Commission, said tanks and troops were deploying heavily around the Jabal al-Zawiya district of the province. "Large numbers of residents from eight villages in that area have decamped," Fadl told AFP, adding that residents of the city of Idlib itself were also leaving. "The government troops have asked members of the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA) to surrender their weapons through messages on mosque loudspeakers or through local officials," Fadl said. "I expect the army to first storm Idlib and then decide from there what to do." He said one civilian was "executed" Thursday in Jabal al-Zawiya and five homes were burned down to punish the local population for supporting the rebel fighters. There are concerns that Idlib, a mountainous province near the Turkish border, could suffer the same fate as Baba Amr which was stormed by government troops on March 1 after a month-long blitz. Idlib is considered strategically important because of the presence of a large number of FSA members, particularly in the Jabal al-Zawiya area. Abdul Rahman told AFP that festivities were taking place on Thursday between security forces and rebel fighters in the Idlib village of Kfar Nabal. On Wednesday, the opposition Syrian National Council appealed to the international community and the Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... to act urgently at all levels to avoid any repetition of what happened in Baba Amr. Posted by: Fred 2012-03-09 |
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