Monday, 10 September 2012
A Syrian refugee holds her child as she sits in her tent
at al-Zaatri refugee camp in the Jordanian city of Mafraq, near the
border with Syria. (Reuters)
U.N. and Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi on Monday begins
his Syria mission by meeting League officials and senior Egyptian
leaders before heading to Damascus on his first official trip to the
region, as violence leaves more deaths across Syria.
Brahimi, replacing former U.N. chief Kofi Annan who quit over divisions in the U.N. Security Council on the deadly violence that has gripped Syria for nearly 18 months, arrived in Cairo late on Sunday from New York via Paris, according to AFP.
Annan stepped down as international efforts to end the conflict faltered, and with no signs of the bloodshed ending, expectations are low that Algeria’s former foreign minister will have any more success than his predecessor.
Brahimi, replacing former U.N. chief Kofi Annan who quit over divisions in the U.N. Security Council on the deadly violence that has gripped Syria for nearly 18 months, arrived in Cairo late on Sunday from New York via Paris, according to AFP.
Annan stepped down as international efforts to end the conflict faltered, and with no signs of the bloodshed ending, expectations are low that Algeria’s former foreign minister will have any more success than his predecessor.
More than 27,000 people have been
killed since the Syrian conflict erupted in March last year, according
to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The United Nations puts the
death toll at 20,000.
As many as 137 people have been killed by the fire of Syrian forces across the country on Sunday, the Syrian Network for Human Rights said. Regime forces have committed a new massacre in Maarat al-Numan in Idlib that left 8 people killed, the Syrian General revolution Commission said. Meanwhile, another massacre was reported by the Syrian regime forces against seven children who were playing at the Jabal Ain Maneen in Damascus suburbs, activists said.
Brahimi, a veteran troubleshooter, has already said he was “scared” of the mission awaiting him in Syria, and has described the bloodshed there as “staggering” and the destruction as “catastrophic.”
Brahimi’s spokesman Ahmed Fawzi told reporters at Cairo airport the peace envoy will meet Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Mursi, Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr, League Secretary General Nabil al-Arabi and other officials on Monday.
Fawzi said the date of Brahimi’s visit to Syria will be fixed once the final details of his program of meetings are set.
Brahimi’s mission begins with key Security Council members the United States and Russia split on how to tackle the conflict and as fighting rages, with dozens of people dying in Syria every day.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday that a new Security Council resolution on Syria would be pointless if it had “no teeth,” because President Bashar al-Assad would ignore it.
Speaking in Russia, Clinton said she was willing to work with Moscow on a new resolution but warned that Washington would step up support to end Assad’s regime if the measure did not carry consequences.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after meeting Clinton that he hoped to seek Security Council approval for a peace plan agreed in June in Geneva that called for a ceasefire and political transition.
Clinton said if differences with Moscow persist, “then we will work with like-minded states to support a Syrian opposition to hasten the day when Assad falls.”
Washington has said it is providing non-lethal assistance to the opposition in Syria, whose regime has been a Moscow ally since the Cold War.
As part of his diplomatic push, Brahimi may try to enlist Iran. In Tehran the Mehr news agency quoted an official as saying Brahimi was contemplating visiting the Islamic republic – Syria’s diehard ally -- after Damascus.
Annan had also visited Tehran to try to get it involved in finding an end to the bloodshed, but Washington has accused Iran of playing a “nefarious” role in Syria.
Arab leaders, meanwhile, have denounced the Syrian regime for carrying out “crimes against humanity.”
Arab foreign ministers on Wednesday condemned “the pursuit of violence, killings and ugly crimes carried out by the Syrian authorities and their ‘shabbiha’ militias against Syrian civilians.”
Even as the latest diplomatic push to resolve the crisis unfolds, the fighting in Syria continues unabated, with scores of people reported killed.
The conflict has also triggered a massive exodus, with current Syrian refugee numbers in neighboring countries now 235,000, according to official U.N. figures.
Two bombs, meanwhile, exploded simultaneously on Sunday night next to Syrian army compounds in the northern city of Aleppo, killing and wounding scores of Assad’s forces, residents and opposition activists said, according to Reuters.
The bombs targeted makeshift barracks and the military police headquarters, situated in two adjacent sealed off districts in the center of the city, said several residents and opposition campaigners from Aleppo.
The state news agency said an explosion near a hospital and a school in the Municipal Stadium district killed 17 people and wounded at least 40. Residents said the facilities were used to house soldiers fighting an 18-month uprising against Assad.
The Noble Aleppo brigade of the Free Syrian Army said in a statement it carried out the Muncipal Stadium district attack, killing or wounding 200 troops. It said the bombs were planted inside the buildings in cooperation with a loyalist sympathizer.
Syrian warplanes earlier bombed a residential district to the east after rebels overran army barracks there, killing and wounding dozens of people and exacerbating a water shortage in Syria's biggest city after a pipeline burst, activists said.
Assad has resorted increasingly to aerial bombardment to keep rebels fighting to overthrow him in check after they took control of residential neighborhoods and made forays into the center of Aleppo, Syria’s commercial and industrial capital.
The uprising has polarized global powers, preventing effective international intervention, and is turning increasingly sectarian with the risk of spillover into adjacent Arab states with similar communal divisions.
Assad, whose family has rule Syria for 42 years, has repeatedly said the revolt is the handiwork of Islamist “terrorists” and not a popular movement for democratic change.
As many as 137 people have been killed by the fire of Syrian forces across the country on Sunday, the Syrian Network for Human Rights said. Regime forces have committed a new massacre in Maarat al-Numan in Idlib that left 8 people killed, the Syrian General revolution Commission said. Meanwhile, another massacre was reported by the Syrian regime forces against seven children who were playing at the Jabal Ain Maneen in Damascus suburbs, activists said.
Brahimi, a veteran troubleshooter, has already said he was “scared” of the mission awaiting him in Syria, and has described the bloodshed there as “staggering” and the destruction as “catastrophic.”
Brahimi’s spokesman Ahmed Fawzi told reporters at Cairo airport the peace envoy will meet Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Mursi, Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr, League Secretary General Nabil al-Arabi and other officials on Monday.
Fawzi said the date of Brahimi’s visit to Syria will be fixed once the final details of his program of meetings are set.
Brahimi’s mission begins with key Security Council members the United States and Russia split on how to tackle the conflict and as fighting rages, with dozens of people dying in Syria every day.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday that a new Security Council resolution on Syria would be pointless if it had “no teeth,” because President Bashar al-Assad would ignore it.
Speaking in Russia, Clinton said she was willing to work with Moscow on a new resolution but warned that Washington would step up support to end Assad’s regime if the measure did not carry consequences.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after meeting Clinton that he hoped to seek Security Council approval for a peace plan agreed in June in Geneva that called for a ceasefire and political transition.
Clinton said if differences with Moscow persist, “then we will work with like-minded states to support a Syrian opposition to hasten the day when Assad falls.”
Washington has said it is providing non-lethal assistance to the opposition in Syria, whose regime has been a Moscow ally since the Cold War.
As part of his diplomatic push, Brahimi may try to enlist Iran. In Tehran the Mehr news agency quoted an official as saying Brahimi was contemplating visiting the Islamic republic – Syria’s diehard ally -- after Damascus.
Annan had also visited Tehran to try to get it involved in finding an end to the bloodshed, but Washington has accused Iran of playing a “nefarious” role in Syria.
Arab leaders, meanwhile, have denounced the Syrian regime for carrying out “crimes against humanity.”
Arab foreign ministers on Wednesday condemned “the pursuit of violence, killings and ugly crimes carried out by the Syrian authorities and their ‘shabbiha’ militias against Syrian civilians.”
Even as the latest diplomatic push to resolve the crisis unfolds, the fighting in Syria continues unabated, with scores of people reported killed.
The conflict has also triggered a massive exodus, with current Syrian refugee numbers in neighboring countries now 235,000, according to official U.N. figures.
Two bombs, meanwhile, exploded simultaneously on Sunday night next to Syrian army compounds in the northern city of Aleppo, killing and wounding scores of Assad’s forces, residents and opposition activists said, according to Reuters.
The bombs targeted makeshift barracks and the military police headquarters, situated in two adjacent sealed off districts in the center of the city, said several residents and opposition campaigners from Aleppo.
The state news agency said an explosion near a hospital and a school in the Municipal Stadium district killed 17 people and wounded at least 40. Residents said the facilities were used to house soldiers fighting an 18-month uprising against Assad.
The Noble Aleppo brigade of the Free Syrian Army said in a statement it carried out the Muncipal Stadium district attack, killing or wounding 200 troops. It said the bombs were planted inside the buildings in cooperation with a loyalist sympathizer.
Syrian warplanes earlier bombed a residential district to the east after rebels overran army barracks there, killing and wounding dozens of people and exacerbating a water shortage in Syria's biggest city after a pipeline burst, activists said.
Assad has resorted increasingly to aerial bombardment to keep rebels fighting to overthrow him in check after they took control of residential neighborhoods and made forays into the center of Aleppo, Syria’s commercial and industrial capital.
The uprising has polarized global powers, preventing effective international intervention, and is turning increasingly sectarian with the risk of spillover into adjacent Arab states with similar communal divisions.
Assad, whose family has rule Syria for 42 years, has repeatedly said the revolt is the handiwork of Islamist “terrorists” and not a popular movement for democratic change.
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