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

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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.

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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:

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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."

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Op dinsdag 28 juni 2011 13:04 schreef anabolefreak het volgende:

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Arme mensen, ze gaan gewoon vrijwillig terug, ze gaan de dood tegemoet, het wrede syrische leger zal ze opwachten en doden........ Of toch niet?

Wel vreemd he dat mensen die eerst vluchten nu vrijwillig terug gaan....
En dat terwijl men ons probeert te doen geloven dat het leger daar iedereen afmaakt.. Of zou het leger dan daadwerkelijk gewapende bendes hebben uitgemoord/verjaagd zodat deze mensen weer veilig terug durven te gaan?