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HRW: Syria forces Conducting Summary Executions
[An Nahar] Syrian security forces and pro-regime militias have executed more than 100 civilians and rebel fighters in attacks on protest hubs since late 2011, Human Rights Watch... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world... said on Monday. Many of the summary and extrajudicial executions were carried out last month, and at least 85 of those killed were residents who never took part in fighting, including women and kiddies, said the New York-based watchdog. HRW, which made the allegations in a 25-page report based on the accounts of witnesses, urged the United Nations ...an idea whose time has gone... Security Council to ensure such crimes are documented. "In a desperate attempt to crush the uprising, Syrian forces have executed people in cold blood, civilians and opposition fighters alike," HRW emergencies researcher Ole Solvang said in a statement. "They are doing it in broad daylight and in front of witnesses, evidently not concerned about any accountability for their crimes." The report said many of the executions occurred in the flashpoint provinces of Homs and Idlib, among them "at least 47 people, mainly women and kiddies" in the city of Homs on March 11 and 12. It said that in such cases, the security forces acting alone or together with Shabiha snuffies executed people trying to flee, shot or stabbed people in their homes, or executed residents while conducting house searches. In the report, one resident of Homs' Baba Amr district described how the army executed his brother and four of his neighbors when they overran the city on March 2 "Louai, who asked that his real name not be used for fear of reprisals, said that the army first entered his neighbors' house, dragged the four men who were there outside, and slaughtered them with knives in front of their families. "The soldiers then came into Louai's house, and, when he and his brother raised their hands, shot at them both, wounding Louai and killing his brother," said HRW. The watchdog appealed to the Security Council to ensure any U.N. mission mandated to oversee a peace plan drawn up by international envoy Kofi Annan  ...Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh and so far the worst Secretary-General of the UN. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for something or other that probably sounded good at the time. In December 2004, reports surfaced that Kofi's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna, which had won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Program. Kofi Annan called for an investigation to look into the allegations, which stirred up the expected cesspool but couldn't seem to come up with enough evidence to indict Kofi himself, or even Kojo...is allowed to collect evidence of such crimes. The plan on ending the year-long bloodshed in Syria appeared to be in jeopardy on Monday, less than 24 hours before government forces were supposed to start pulling back their armor from protest hubs. Posted by: Fred 2012-04-10 |
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