Onrust in Syri� #6 - Waar vrijheid als muziek in de oren klinkt.

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Op woensdag 22 juni 2011 11:00 schreef anabolefreak het volgende:
dat zeg ik niet, maar het is er zeker niet beter op geworden....

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Er zijn meerdere aanvallen geweest, plus datgene wat je niet in het nieuws hoort.

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Afijn, in Egypte zal de tijd het leren....
Syrie is toch net ff een verhaal apart.
Ik heb in egypte geen grote pro Mubarak demonstraties gezien

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Op dinsdag 21 juni 2011 14:45 schreef Papierversnipperaar het volgende:
The Guardian:

[..]

Flashback:

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Syri� wordt 'ongekend voorbeeld van democratie'

De Syrische minister van buitenlandse zaken Walid Moallem heeft vandaag gezworen binnen drie maanden een 'ongekend voorbeeld van democratie' in Syri� te presenteren. Het is een vergaande belofte in het door onrust geplaagde land.

'Wij zullen een toonbeeld van democratie bieden', zei Moallem in zijn toespraak. 'Er zal sociale gerechtigheid zijn, gelijkheid voor de wet en aansprakelijkheid.' De beloftes van Moallem gingen een stuk verder dan de onduidelijke toezeggingen die de Syrische president Bashar Assad maandag deed.

De minister riep tegenstanders van het regime op terug te keren naar hun vaderland om de politieke dialoog aan te gaan. Hij beloofde dat 'zelfs de grootste tegenstander' van de regering niet wordt gearresteerd.

Moallem ging ook in op de beschuldigingen van de Verenigde Staten dat Iraanse troepen Syri� helpen de opstand in het land neer te slaan. 'Er is politieke steun van Iran en Hezbollah. Ze willen allebei dat de rust in Syri� weerkeert en ze steunen de hervormingen die door president Assad zijn aangekondigd', zei Moallem. 'Maar er is geen sprake van militaire steun.'

Charmeoffensief
Moallem haalde ook uit naar de Europese sancties tegen het Syrische regime. Hij zei dat 'we zullen vergeten dat Europa op de kaart staat'.
Assad ligt in binnen- en buitenland steeds meer onder druk. Demonstranten eisen zijn vertrek en lijken allerminst bereid met het regime te onderhandelen, met name omdat eerdere onderhandelingen geen enkel resultaat boekten. In dit licht kan de toespraak van Moallam dan ook worden gezien als een soort charmeoffensief, bedoeld om naar buiten toe vertrouwen uit te stralen.

Het geweld in Syri� heeft de afgelopen maanden naar schatting 1400 levens ge�ist. Tienduizend mensen zijn door het regime opgepakt en achter de tralies verdwenen.

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Syrian embassy accused of threatening protesters in UK


UK activists say Assad agents have visited and intimidated them at home as campaigners fear for their Syrian families' safety

Claims that Syrians involved in anti-government protests in the UK have been threatened and intimidated by agents of the Assad regime have prompted discussions between Scotland Yard and Foreign Office officials.

Syrians who have protested in London say they have received phone calls and visits to their homes, while members of their families in Syria have been threatened.

One man described how the country's secret police had visited his parents' home warning them to stop him taking part in any further demonstrations after he was photographed outside the embassy in London. Another said he had been warned not to mix with the demonstrators by a Syrian official after a protest this month.

The demonstrators say that although the embassy does not have the power to arrest expatriates, the regime can attempt to control their behaviour by intimidating and detaining their relatives, or threatening to arrest them if they return to Syria.

The Foreign Office said it had been made aware of claims that Syria's embassy has photographed protesters, and that those images have been shown to their families in Syria in an attempt to harass them.

"We are looking into these reports and discussing them with the police. We urge anyone who's been the subject of any intimidation to report it to the police," said a Foreign Office spokesman.

The Syrian embassy denied the claims, insisting it served the entire Syrian community, irrespective of an individual's political beliefs or actions. But a friend of three people whose families have been persecuted said that they were "extremely frightened" and were deciding whether to press ahead with their claims against the Syrian regime.

"It has to be understood that this is extremely serious for these people and their families," said the London-based activist, who did not want to be named for fear of reprisals. "They are worried about what has happened and the publicity around them and what that could mean for their families. They are considering carefully what to do next."

A spokesman for the Metropolitan police said it had no knowledge of any complaint being made against the Syrian embassy, but added it was aware of the allegations. The Foreign Office urged any of those who felt they had been intimidated or threatened to come forward.

"Any such action [by the Syrian embassy] would be wholly wrong and unacceptable," said a spokesman. "We've taken action in the past against diplomats whose activities were inappropriate and contrary to the interests of the UK, and we would do so again."

Since the start of the Arab spring a number of regimes have been accused of intimidating their UK-based citizens. In April the Foreign Office condemned the Bahrain government when students on scholarships in Britain had their funding withdrawn after attending anti-government protests. The students said the regime had put intense pressure on their families after they were photographed attending a peaceful protest in Manchester in solidarity with the country's pro-democracy movement.They said they feared their relatives could suffer beatings and torture as a result of the Bahrain government's crackdown and that they were likely to be arrested upon their return.

In May the UK expelled two Libyan diplomats over allegations they were operating against UK-based demonstrators opposed to Muammar Gaddafi. The Foreign Office refused to comment on the behaviour which led to the expulsion of the diplomats and their dependants, but it was widely reported that they are suspected of seeking to intimidate pro-opposition Libyans .

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Syria accuses EU of meddling as it imposes sanctions

Syria calls measures the equivalent to 'war' while promising to turn country into model democracy

Syria has lashed out at international "meddling" in its internal affairs and lambasted new EU sanctions that also target the commander of the al-Quds force of Iran's revolutionary guards, accused by the west of helping crush the unprecedented unrest.

Walid al-Moallem, Syria's foreign minister, called the sanctions the equivalent to "war", while promising to turn the country into a model democracy.

He accused EU states of trying to "plant strife and chaos" after they agreed to extend punitive measures against Bashar al-Assad's regime in response to the repression of protests that has cost 1,400 lives in three months.

The Guardian has learned that the sanctions target General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the elite al-Quds, who is already subject to US sanctions. Moallem denied that Tehran or Syria's Lebanese protege Hezbollah had been involved.

He singled out France for harbouring ambitions derived from its history as Syria's colonial ruler and urged Turkey to "reconsider" its increasinglyown hostile stance. Moallem blamed al-Qaida for killings of security personnel. Around 300 soldiers and other members of the security forces have been killed, alongside civilian casualties, in this bloody chapter of the Arab spring.

The minister's comments showed the Syrian regime flexing its muscles amid the overwhelmingly negative reaction to reform proposals Assad made in his speech on Monday. The US called for "action, not words" in response to that address – only Assad's third since the crisis began.

"We will forget that Europe is on the map and we will look east, south and towards every hand that is extended to us," Moallem said in a televised speech. Russia and China are continuing to block western attempts to pass a UN security council resolution condemning Syria.

British officials dismissed his remarks. A Foreign Office spokesman said: "It is the regime's own brutal repression of peaceful protest that is harming the Syrian people and the Syrian economy. We will continue to increase the pressure on President Assad and those around him until they recognise that the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people must be met with reform not repression."

The new EU sanctions target individuals and companies in Syria's business community to increase economic pressure on the regime, as well as on Soleimani and two other Iranians accused of "providing military equipment and support".

Syria is no stranger to international isolation. During the 2003 Iraq war many in Washington regarded it as an easy target for criticism. Tensions were heightened in 2005 when Lebanon's ex-prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri was assassinated – though Damascus always denied responsibility.

"Most Syrians would be horrified at the thought of reliving the isolation endured by Syria in the 80s and part of the 90s," said Rime Allaf, a Syrian analyst at the Chatham House thinktank in London. "While the idea of foreign intervention is overwhelmingly rejected by regime fans and critics alike, diplomatic pressure is to be expected from Europe."

But analysts believe the regime still thinks it can contain this crisis through a mixture of repression and reform.

Moallem promised reforms that would allow Syria to "give lessons for others in democracy". A draft law to regulate new political parties, potentially ending Ba'athist dominance, has been published. After Assad's speech, state media announced a presidential decree granting amnesty to prisoners, excluding political detainees.

But domestic opposition, which appears to be slowly growing, rejected the pledges as insincere and too little, too late. "The parties law is not bad," said one opposition analyst who asked for anonymity. "But no one really believes that the regime will allow true power-sharing because it will ultimately lead to its downfall."

It is equally unclear who will take part in a national dialogue. The Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC), a group of grassroots opposition activists, rejected calls for dialogue as a way to "gain more time" for the regime. Veteran opposition figures who had been meeting the government, including Louay Hussein and Michel Kilo, have refused to continue.

Meanwhile, the LCC said security forces had raided Damascus University dormitories on Tuesday night and again on Wednesday morning making arrests, smashing computers and leaving one student dead.

The raid came after at least people were shot dead by pro-government forces in Homs, Hama and Deir Ezzor on Tuesday amid rising tensions as pro-regime rallies and anti-regime demonstrations poured onto the streets.

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Syri�rs ontvluchten geweld grensgebied met Turkije

Honderden Syri�rs zijn de grens met Turkije overgestoken om een aan een aanval van het Syrische leger te ontkomen. De escalerende militaire campagne is gericht op de tegenstand tegen president Bashar Al-Assad. Dit meldt persbureau Reuters.

Een van de vluchtelingen, een boer uit Jisr al-Shugour, zegt dat men in paniek is. Volgens ooggetuigen stromen de vluchtelingen Turkije binnen bij Guvecci. De meesten komen uit de regio Khirbet al-Joz.

Nu al zijn duizenden Syri�rs het buurland ingevlucht na aanvallen op dorpen en steden verder in het zuiden. Het zou gaan om meer dan tienduizend mensen in de laatste twee weken. In Turkije zijn vier offici�le kampen geopend voor de vluchtelingen.

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Turkey tells Bashar al-Assad to cease Syria repression

Recep Tayyip Erdogan asks president to sack brother and military mastermind as more refugees cross the border

Tension between Turkey and Syria is worsening as thousands of refugees from repression by president Bashar al-Assad flee across the border

Officials in Ankara were watching closely as Syrian forces deployed in a village close to the border, Khirbet al-Jouz, after Turkey had flatly rejected an appeal from Damascus to moderate its increasingly angry public comments about the crisis.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's prime minister, has attacked the repression as "savagery" and urged Assad to sack its military mastermind, his brother Maher, and implement genuine reforms in the spirit of the "Arab spring".

But Erdogan has so far failed to demand that the Syrian president stand down – as he did with Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and Libya's Muammar Gaddafi.

Still, officials, diplomats and analysts say that a bilateral relationship that has flourished politically and economically in recent years is now badly, perhaps irreparably, damaged.

"The rapprochement between Erdogan and Assad has pretty much broken down," said Fadi Hakura of the Chatham House thinktank in London. "Turkey is becoming ever more strident and direct, and this is causing deep unease in Damascus."

On Wednesday the Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, publicly urged Turkey to reconsider its hostile stand, but the Turkish ambassador immediately dismissed the call.

"The relationship has become very frosty," said Hugh Pope, Istanbul director for the International Crisis Group. Erdogan had been urging Assad to make domestic changes since before the uprising began in March.

Ahead of Assad's speech on Monday, Ersat Hurmuzlu, an adviser to president Abdullah Gul, said Assad had a week in which to act – but Turkish officials were left disappointed by Assad's lacklustre performance.

"We had high expectations that the Syrian president would deliver," said a senior Turkish official. "But we were disappointed."

The Turkish-Syrian honeymoon began when Erdogan came to power in 2003, and cooled Turkey's once close relations with Israel while making overtures to the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.

Following his re-election this month he vowed to reach out to the Middle East and beyond to promote "justice, the rule of law ... freedom and democracy", distancing himself from the traditional stabile friendships with Arab dictators.

"When Turkey has to make a choice between regimes and people," the senior offiical said, "it will always be on the side of the people."

British officials describe a "meeting of minds" when David Cameron spoke to Erdogan last week. The US and Britain say that they hope a policy rethink in Ankara will also include a distancing from Iran and its alleged nuclear ambitions.

"The Turks are increasingly unhappy with what is happening in Syria," said a western diplomat. Another consequence has been a renewed warming of relations with Israel after the row over the Gaza aid flotilla last year, when a Turkish ship was boarded on the open seas by Israeli commandos and nine activists killed.

Syria was furious last month when Turkey hosted a high-profile conference of Syrian opposition activists in Antalya.

Turkish officials deny any plan to create a "security zone" on the border – a sensitive step given memories of Ottoman days (and the Turkish border province of Hatay, which Syria continues to claim as unjustly ceded in a plebiscite), and especially without an international mandate.

Turks recognise the change that has taken place. "Turkey's close rapport with the US regarding ... Syrian politics shows Turkey has completely parted company with Assad," commented Nihat Ali �zcan in the Hurriyet daily.

"Erdogan doesn't want another diplomatic crisis in the context of Syria, like the one instigated by the nuclear issue with Iran. We can say that he is ideologically much closer to the Muslim Brotherhood than Assad."

The US has praised Turkey for its "big heart" in helping refugees. "But clearly, Turkish patience appears to be wearing thin, and we share all of their humanitarian and political concerns," said a US state department spokesman.

"Erdogan is in a very challenging position," Hakura added. "He is trying to react to facts on the ground in Syria, but at the same time he hasn't called on Assad to step down. The more violence escalates, the more difficult his position will be."

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Aleppo: Syria's sleeping giant stirs

As the uprising enters its fourth month, Syria's second city is becoming increasingly unsettled.

On the surface, all seems calm in Syria's second city.

Traffic and tourists might not be bustling along Aleppo's ancient thoroughfares in the abundance they once did, but to a casual observer there appears little sign that the turmoil of Syria's four-month old uprising has made much of an impact on its largest city.

But talk to shopkeepers, hotel managers and traders in Aleppo's famous covered souk and one soon finds grumblings of dissent.

For in the Syrian capital of commerce, no one is making money anymore, threatening to undermine the key pillar of a long established pact between Aleppo's Sunni merchant class and the imposed stability of the Alawite-led regime.

"Where are you, Halab?" chanted thousands of protestors, using the city's Arabic name, exasperated by Aleppo's conspicuous quiet while streets in towns and cities across the country filled with demonstrators every Friday since mid-March.

The answer is an interlocking mix of political, religious and economic interests which the regime has been largely successful in co-opting and which have kept Aleppo quiet, but which appear, as the uprising enters its fourth month, to be coming increasingly unstuck, threatening what analysts describe as the regime's Achilles heel.

"If Aleppo were to rise up, it would mean that one of the metrics by which the West is charting the fall of the Assad regime would have been met," said Andrew Tabler, a Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

A student at Aleppo University was beaten to death by security forces during a pro-democracy demonstration on June 17, activists said - the first death of a protester there since the uprising began and a grim example of the length the regime will go to impose its stability on the country's largest city.

Mohammed el-Ektaa was among a small group of students who held protests on the university campus before being attacked by secret police and pro-Assad thugs, known as shabiha, said a member of the Syrian
Revolution Co-ordinators' Union (SRCU), an activist network in the city.

Mohammed's body was returned to his family by secret police shortly after the attack. Another student was also beaten and arrested during the protests, said the SRCU, while secret police broke into student dormitories making arbitrary arrests. The SRCU member said he had seen one student jump from his third floor room to avoid being arrested.

Students have been at the vanguard of attempts to bring Syria's nationwide protests against the Assad family's 41-year-dictatorship to Aleppo, a city of some four million, one of the largest in the Levant.

'Security touring the mosques'

Though predominantly Sunni Muslim, increasingly religiously conservative and - during the bloodiest days of Iraq’s civil war - a producer of the murky jihadist preacher known as Abu Qaqa, who called for the slaughter of Americans in Iraq, Aleppo's mosques have long been controlled by the secret police of the Alawite-led regime, an offshoot of Shia Islam.

Since its military crushed an armed rebellion in Aleppo led by the Muslim Brotherhood in 1980, the regime uses the state-run ministry of religious endowments to appoint Aleppo's preachers, ensuring worshippers at Friday prayers never again hear the call to turn against their own rulers.

Though an advocate of violent jihad in the name of Islam, Abu Qaqa, a Kurd, was allowed to preach in his Aleppo mosque unhindered by the secret police, until he was gunned down in September 2007 after reports surfaced he had delivered a list of Sunni extremists to state intelligence.

Today, however, the murky relationship between the regime and Aleppo's preachers is being challenged by a message less easily drowned out in violence.

"The people are becoming angrier every week and the government is not giving much, just some promises. Every Friday I feel some worshippers want to demonstrate but I call on them to be quiet," said a prominent Muslim scholar who preaches at one of Aleppo's largest mosques, asking to remain anonymous fearing regime reprisals.

"To see hundreds of students demonstrating, even if they are small demonstrations, is symbolic: They are the young and educated. Some sheikhs [preachers] told me they cannot control their people any more and security men are touring around the mosques every Friday. It's only a matter of weeks and Aleppo will see big demonstrations."

A second, even more significant pillar of the regime's control over Aleppo now also appears to be beginning to crumble as well: the economy.

Sitting at the end of the Silk Road, the ancient trading route between Asia and the Mediterranean, Aleppo is one of the oldest centres of commerce in the world.

Specialising in textiles and industry, modern Aleppo's economy is largely shaped by its access to, and competition with, the vast market of Turkey, just 50km north.

Flood of Turkish imports

For decades Aleppo's original Sunnis merchant families did very well trading with their co-religionists in Turkey while maintaining stability in the city as part of a deal with the Alawite-led regime of Damascus.

But from 2004, Aleppo's industries have been hit hard by a flood of imports from Turkey following a free-trade agreement between the two nations, built on Bashar al-Assad's personal friendship with Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister.

Today, however, Erdogan accuses President Assad's regime of "savagery" against its own people, leading regional calls for the regime to end its brutal crackdown.

"The regime has bribed a lot of Sunni business interests, leaving them to do business while being protected by the security apparatus," said Imad Salamey, assistant professor of political science at the Lebanese American University (LAU) and an expert on Syrian affairs.

"But eventually the bourgeois will come to feel the regime can no longer provide them with economic stability and that business as usual is no longer viable. They will no longer feel committed to the existing system. I think it’s a matter of time."

In a speech at Damascus University on June 20, Assad acknowledged that the greatest challenge facing his regime as it attempts to crush the uprising "is the weakness or collapse of the Syrian economy."

"Aleppo was one of the areas that suffered extensively from the regime's bloody crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood, so the fear factor still remains," Tabler, of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said.

"When added to the interests of the city's merchants and traders, it's not surprising protestors have not come out in force. But as the protests have moved into Aleppo's hinterland, this will put the fear factor to the test."

As well as protests in Aleppo University, June 17 also saw pro-democracy protests in the Aleppo neighbourhoods of Salahedeen and Seif al-Dawali. It was the second Friday of protests in Seif al-Dawali.
"Although it is slowly, it is very important to see Aleppo joining the uprising," an opposition leader in the city said.

In the villages north of Aleppo, a witness estimated around 5,000 protesters had turned out across Tal Rifaat, Hreitan, Mareaa and Aazaz. In Hreitan protesters called on local residents to join them in the streets, chanting: "The one who not participate has no conscience."

A week before, on June 10, the first protests had spread from Hreitan, 10km north of Aleppo, to Akhtareen, 13km northeast of the city, where several thousand gathered to call for freedom and support Jisr al-Shughour, which is less than 100km west of Aleppo.

Massive layoffs imminent

Sitting behind his desk in a lavishly decorated office, a photograph of President Assad hanging on the wall, a 45-year-old Sunni businessman from Aleppo's Old City cautioned that the economic consequences of the crisis in Syria could soon fuel further protests.

"Today I am losing money as no one wants to buy garments and textile. Syrians are buying bread and food stuffs as they are worried about the future. I am seriously considering having to sack or give unpaid vacation to a third of my workforce," he said.

Late last month Assad had met a delegation of Aleppo business leaders, said the textile factory owner. The businessmen had urged Assad to end the crisis in Syria swiftly to avoid massive layoffs.

"The government promised to decrease fuel and electricity prices, but this is not enough for us," said the textile factory owner.

"The government looks to us as their partners who should help them in this crisis. But if the situation continues, Aleppo will feel the economic consequences and we will see demonstrations in the city."

In April, the International Monetary Fund lowered Syria's economic growth rate this year from 5.5 per cent to three per cent. The International Institute of Finance, an association of major global banks, paints an even bleaker picture, projecting Syria's GDP could contract by as much as three per cent in fiscal 2011.

Finally, the political pact that kept Aleppo, and much of Syria's population, bound to the regime for decades appears also to be coming unstuck in the demands and protests of the students who have led the opposition in the city.

Abdul Qader, 22, a student at Aleppo University's Faculty of Arts is one of those.

"During the last four decades, the Baathists were telling us that the government gives us, the citizens, everything for free or with a subsidised price and for that reason we should be silent," he said. "But now we get no free services and no bread so we want freedom."

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Weer doden bij massaal protest in Syri�

Bij massaal protest tegen het bewind in Syri� zijn vandaag zeker 15 doden en tientallen gewonden gevallen. Dit is van mensenrechtenactivisten in het Arabische land vernomen. Na het vrijdaggebed zijn opnieuw tienduizenden mensen in diverse steden de straat opgegaan om het aftreden te eisen van president Bashar al-Assad.

Oppositiebewegingen hadden via sociale media zoals de Facebookgroep Syrische Revolutie 2011 opgeroepen tot nieuwe protesten. Veiligheidstroepen openden het vuur en doodden demonstranten in de hoofdstad Damascus en in de steden Kiswah en Homs.

Gewapende mannen
Veelal jonge Syri�rs komen al ruim 3 maanden in opstand tegen Assads alleenheerschappij. Keihard optreden tegen de betogers door leger en politie heeft in die periode volgens uiteenlopende schattingen al 1100 tot meer dan 1600 levens ge�ist. De Syrische staatstelevisie stelde vrijdag opnieuw dat de burgerdoden het gevolg zijn van 'gewapende mannen' die op leger en politie schieten.

Assad probeerde deze week opnieuw met vage beloftes de gemoederen te sussen. Hij zou een dialoog willen en bereid zijn tot hervormingen die de macht van zijn eigen Baathpartij inperken. Maar ondertussen zetten zijn troepen aan de grens met Turkije de aanval in op duizenden mensen die op de vlucht waren geslagen voor het geweld.

Toevlucht
De Turkse autoriteiten meldden vrijdag dat al bijna 12.000 Syri�rs hun toevlucht hebben gezocht in de Turkse grensprovincie Hatay. Vrijdag zijn naar schatting opnieuw 1500 mensen de grens overgestoken. Syrische troepen kwamen donderdag in actie in de grensstreek.

Langs de grens met Turkije bivakkeren ook duizenden mensen die het geweld in Syri� zijn ontvlucht, maar die de stap nog niet hebben willen nemen om de grens over steken. Ze worden enigszins bevoorraad vanaf Turks grondgebied. Onder de 12.000 vluchtelingen waren vijftig mensen dusdanig gewond geraakt dat ze na aankomst in Turkije in ziekenhuizen zijn opgenomen.

De leiders van de EU toonden zich vrijdag tijdens hun top in Brussel zeer bezorgd over de situatie in Syri�. Ze veroordelen 'in de sterkst mogelijke termen de voortdurende onderdrukking en het onaanvaardbare en schokkende geweld' van het Syrische regime tegen zijn burgers. Het regime roept daardoor twijfels op over zijn legitimiteit. De EU besloot donderdag al tot uitbreiding van zijn sancties tegen Syri�. De lijst van personen en bedrijven die gestraft worden met het blokkeren van Europese tegoeden en het opleggen van reisverboden wordt uitgebreid.

Rondreis
De Chinese premier Wen Jiabao is vrijdag aangekomen in Hongarije, tot volgende week de voorzitter van de Europese Unie. Wen zal tijdens zijn rondreis langs diverse EU-landen vermoedelijk ook spreken over de toestand in Syri�. Zijn gastheren Duitsland en Groot-Brittanni� werken aan een VN-resolutie die het optreden van het bewind tegen de volksopstand daar veroordeelt. China is gekant tegen de resolutie en kan, als permanent lid van de Veiligheidsraad, de tekst blokkeren.

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Western journalists return to Syria


Return of press for first time since being expelled in March suggests Syrian regime willing to engage in propaganda war

A trickle of western journalists is being allowed back in to Damascus – under close supervision by government minders – suggesting Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's regime is sufficiently concerned about its hold on power to be willing to engage in a foreign propaganda war.

Sky News anchor Jeremy Thompson was reporting from Damascus on Friday, and CNN's Arwan Damon, who is of Syrian and American descent, broadcast from the capital on Thursday. The Sunday Times has a reporter in the country, but declined to confirm their identity on Friday.

Foreign journalists were expelled from the country shortly after unrest began in March, and have been concentrating their efforts on the Turkish border, where Syrians have been gathering in refugee camps to escape military crackdowns.

Speaking during a government-arranged tour of the apparently quiet streets of Damascus today, Thompson said: "The very fact that we are here, the first foreign journalists to be allowed visas in three or four months ... suggests that the government is concerned that its message isn't getting out, that the rest of the world misunderstands what they're doing ... and if anything that the propaganda machine of the opposition... is winning the hearts and minds at the moment."

Thompson is hoping to speak to members of the Assad government in the next few days and claimed that the feeling within Damascus was that if he were to lose his grip on power "it could bring terrible instability and most people don't want that despite the protest movement in this country".

Thompson secured his 15-day visa shortly after an interview with Assad adviser Bouthaina Shaaban on Monday. Sky News executives spent the following days requesting permission to return to Syria from Shaaban, fellow Syrian spokesperson Reema Haddad and the Syrian embassy in London.

Head of international news Sarah Whitehead attributed the breakthrough to "good old-fashioned news gathering persistence".

It is understood there are no formal reporting restrictions, but Thompson will need to tread carefully. Whitehead said: "We are there because the Syrians have given us a visa and we hope to report as freely as we can but we'll have to see how it develops over the coming days."

Thompson currently anchors Live at Five with Jeremy Thompson. A seasoned foreign correspondent, he has reported on dozens of wars and conflicts for the BBC and ITN. In 1999, he was the first TV newsman to broadcast live as British peacekeeping forces rolled into Kosovo.

CNN's Damon filmed in Damascus on Thursday, accompanied by minders, and was shown street vendors selling pro-government paraphernalia and a restaurant speaker blaring music in praise of Bashar.

• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".

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Syrische oppositie wil maandag overleg

Opposanten van het regime in Syri� willen maandag overleg voeren om te bekijken hoe de crisis kan worden opgelost. Dit zei de voorzitter van de Syrische Liga voor de Mensenrechten, Abdel Karim Rihawi, vandaag. 'We spreken om te komen tot de formulering van een nationale strategie om de huidige crisis in Syri� te be�indigen', aldus Rihawi. Hij beklemtoonde dat hij niet namens 'de demonstranten in de straat' kon spreken.

Het zou gaan om ongeveer 100 personen die niet aan een politieke partij of beweging verbonden zijn, inclusief de schrijvers Fayez Sara en Louai Hussein. Sinds half maart slaat het regime van president Bashar al-Assad bloedig protesten tegen het bewind en voor democratie neer.

Volgens mensenrechtenactivisten zijn sinds half maart 1332 burgers gedood. Ook zouden 341 leden van de politie, de geheime diensten of strijdkrachten zijn omgekomen. Deze cijfers zijn exclusief de vier doden die zaterdag zijn gemeld.

Militairen hebben in Kassir, in de omgeving van de stad Homs, twee burgers doodgeschoten volgens activisten. In Kiswah, ten zuiden van Damascus, schoten militairen op een begrafenisstoet. Daarbij vielen twee doden. De begrafenis was van een van de 18 mensen die vrijdag zijn doodgeschoten tijdens grote betogingen tegen het regime.

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Syria reinforces northern border as Turkey loses patience with Assad

Advance on Khirbet al-Jouz seen as a warning after Ankara seeks reforms and end to crackdown on Syrian protesters

Syrian officials have ordered military units to step up patrolling near the Turkish border in a warning to its increasingly irate northern neighbour not to establish a buffer zone inside Syria.

Diplomats in Ankara and Beirut believe the Syrian advance on the border village of Khirbet al-Jouz, initially portrayed as a sweep against dissidents, was a veiled threat to Turkey, which is steadily turning on President Bashar al-Assad as his regime's crackdown on dissent continues.

In the wake of Assad's speech last week, Turkish officials gave him one week to start reforms and stop the violent suppression of protests, which is estimated to have killed more than 1,400 people in less than four months. At least 18 were killed and dozens more wounded during nationwide protests on Friday – a relatively low toll compared with the past few Fridays. But the pattern of activists being attacked by the security forces remains the same.

British government officials travelled during the week to the south of Turkey to interview Syrian refugees. A Foreign Office official told the Observer that diplomats are compiling accounts of what happened in Jisr al-Shughour and the villages around it during the first two weeks of this month, when the Syrian army mounted a series of raids, followed by an assault that led almost every resident of the 41,000-strong town to flee, first for the nearby hills, then to Turkey.

Among the allegations being investigated are claims that Iranian soldiers operated alongside Syrian units – especially the Fourth Division of the army, which is led by Assad's brother Maher and has a reputation for ruthlessness.

The European Union last week adopted sanctions against three leading officers of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, among them Qassem Suleimani, commander of the elite Al-Quds force, who is widely regarded as the leader of all the Iranian military's clandestine missions abroad.

A senior diplomat in Beirut said on Friday that intelligence agencies had evidence that Iran sent weapons to Syria, but had not yet determined whether there had been an actual Iranian presence at demonstrations.

In a further sign of Turkish unease with Damascus, officials from the country's Red Crescent who run the five refugee camps along the border no longer seem to be banned from talking to reporters. Embarrassment to Syria has clearly become less of a concern.

Refugee accounts are being used to compile a referral to the international criminal court, which will be asked to prosecute Assad and key regime officials for crimes against humanity. The referral is being prepared by several rights groups, including Insan, which is also compiling testimonies from defecting Syrian soldiers.

Turkey's growing diplomatic anger at Syria has made Istanbul an attractive hub for the Syrian opposition movement, which has received scores of defectors in recent weeks. Beirut, which is less than three hours' drive from Damascus and offers easy access to Syrian citizens, is now considered too dangerous for anti-regime dissidents. "It is a clearing house only," said one Syrian activist who directs a network of dissidents across the border. "There are many ways that the regime can get to people here – they don't even have to be here themselves. They just use their proxies."

One Syrian journalist who fled to Beirut has told the rights group Avaaz of his capture by Lebanese military intelligence officers. The journalist says he was seized from a coffee shop in Jounieh, 25km north of Beirut. He said he was first asked by a stranger to step outside for a conversation, then seized and taken to a fetid barracks where he was interrogated for several days.

"During the days I spent in Beirut, some other Syrian activists were kidnapped and extradited to the Syrian security police," he said. "The Lebanese authorities have also captured the few fugitive Syrian soldiers who had fled Syria through the borders, and then turned them in to Syria, claiming that it had to because of the security agreement signed between the two countries."

At least 1,000 refugees crossed into Lebanon at the Wadi Khalled border point on Friday, including five men with gunshot wounds, after an assault on the Syrian city of Homs, according to Lebanese officials. A resident of the border village told the Observer that Syrian army units had opened fire towards the wounded as they attempted to enter Lebanon.

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A report in the Sunday Telegraph says:

In a worrying sign for Mr Assad and his ability to portray the uprising as a provincial sign show, there is growing evidence that the protest movement is closing in on his two principal strongholds [Aleppo and Damascus]...

After mosque prayers on Friday, when the biggest demonstrations traditionally take place, at least 20 protesters were killed across the country. But, for the first time, a majority of the fatalities were on the outskirts of Damascus.

The capital's residents are all too aware of the rising tension. "Damascus is not the place it was even a week ago," one of its inhabitants, Rami, said. "Anything can happen anywhere now.

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Op maandag 27 juni 2011 14:36 schreef Monidique het volgende:

[..]

Khaddafi is een Libi�r. Zijn leger bestaat voornamelijk uit Libi�rs.

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Op maandag 27 juni 2011 16:38 schreef t-8one het volgende:

[..]

Die huurlingen blijven het wel lang volhouden vind ik.

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Syrian army defector says he was told to shoot unarmed protesters

During a month stationed in Deraa, neither Wasid nor any of his fellow conscripts saw a single armed demonstrator

Wasid, a young Syrian conscript, set off for the town of Deraa in late April filled with the zeal of a soldier going to war. "We were going to fight terrorists," he said.

But less than a day after arriving in Deraa, Wasid was making plans to defect.

The Syrian regime has cast the uprising as a conflict between a loyal military and a large and highly mobile group of heavily armed foreign-backed insurgents, roaming the country attempting to ignite sectarian strife.

Over three hours in an Istanbul safe house, the 20-year-old soldier described events in the southern town where the wave of dissent that has swept Syria first broke out. The young defector's account starkly contradicts the official narrative.

"As soon as we got there, the officers told us not to shoot at the men carrying guns. They said they [the gunmen] were with us. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. It had all been lies."

In the month they were stationed there, neither Wasid nor any of his colleagues saw any demonstrators with weapons in Deraa or the nearby town of Izraa.

And instead of confronting armed insurgents, the unit was given orders to shoot protesters.

"I could not believe what I was hearing – to leave alone the people carrying guns. It shocked me," he said. "We are soldiers and soldiers do not shoot at civilians."

In the weeks leading up his deployment with the Syrian army's 14 division, commanders had given regular briefings on the "violence" ahead. Wasid was convinced he would soon be in combat.

"When we were at the base in Damascus before we left for Deraa, we were not allowed to watch television at all, except for two hours each day when we could watch Rami Makhlouf's channel," he said [Makhlouf, a tycoon, is president Bashar al-Assad's first cousin].

"All they showed were armed groups roaming the villages. I found out later that these groups were on our [the regime's] side – they were the Shabiyeh."

According to Wasid, the Shabiyeh – ghosts – were the only civilian gunmen in town. Their group has strong links to the military and has developed a reputation over recent bloody months of being willing to do dirty work in troublesome towns and villages.

"The first day we arrived there, 24 April, the Shabiyeh came to the base to speak with our officers. It was clear that the relationship was close."

Wasid showed the Guardian his military ID and application for refugee status, copies of which have been kept.

He does not want his real name or photograph used out of fear that his family may be targeted for reprisals.

After many weeks of military crackdowns, the government is now on a diplomatic and media offensive.

Officials are pushing their version of events to a few correspondents who were last week allowed to enter Syria for the first time since March.

The official account has given particular emphasis to claims that Sunni Islamic groups have either initiated or hijacked the uprising's agenda.

"I never saw an Islamist or anybody that resembled one," said Wasid. "And nor did anyone else with me."

He estimated that about 30% of his unit were disaffected with the military.

But neither dissent nor defection are easy in Syria, where conscripts are paid $9 (�6) each month.

"One guy – I only know his name as Wael, he was from the east – told an officer that what we were doing was wrong. The next day he was killed. They said he had been shot by terrorists."

Nevertheless, by 25 May, Wasid and 20 others had mustered the courage to attempt to escape.

He ditched his military fatigues – and the sniper rifle which he had never used – and ran with the group to the highway, where a van took them to Damascus.

"Once we got there, we agreed we would go separate directions. I stayed in Damascus for three days and then left for Turkey. I don't know where the others went."

He crossed the border in the Kurdish northeast of Syria and made his way by bus to Istanbul, where the UNHCR and rights group Avaaz are providing him with help.

Wasid's testimony will be used in a referral to the international criminal court being prepared by another group, Insan.

Four other defectors from Deraa have made their way to Amman in recent days and are also briefing investigators.

Defections have been regularly reported during the uprising, but on a small scale.

Apart from the apparent mutiny of half a base in the northern town of Jisr al-Shughour (where Syrian officials claim soldiers were massacred by terrorists), none of the defections have been large enough to pose a threat to command and control of the army.

Wasid says his anger is directed not at the government, which he believes betrayed him, but at his army colleagues who stayed behind despite also seeing what he had seen in Deraa.

"There were around 100 people each week killed there. They were civilians.

"If I see my colleagues again, not only will I tell others what they have done, but I will find their families and tell them too. And then I will hurt them."