الرئيسية
In this image from amateur video made available by the
Ugarit News group on Friday, Dec. 2, 2011, a soldier takes aim in Homs,
Syria. The United Nations' human rights chief called on the
international community to protect Syrian civilians Friday as violence
surged across the country, with hours of intense shooting that sent
stray bullets whizzing across the border.(AP Photo/Ugarit News Group via
APTN) THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CANNOT INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE CONTENT,
DATE, LOCATION OR AUTHENTICITY OF THIS MATERIAL. TV OUT
By BASSEM MROUE, AP
BEIRUT (AP) — Violence sweeping across Syria has killed 25
people, most of them in a battle between troops and a growing force of
army defectors who have joined the movement to oust the autocratic
president, activists say. The Arab League, meanwhile, has agreed on the
details of economic and diplomatic sanctions against the regime.
The
revolt against Bashar Assad's rule began with peaceful protests in
mid-March, triggering a brutal crackdown. The unrest has steadily become
bloodier as defectors and some civilians take up arms, prompting the
United Nations' human rights chief to refer to it this week as a civil
war and urge the international community to protect Syrian civilians.
Sanctions
by the United States, the European Union, Turkey and the 22-member Arab
League have so far failed to blunt the turmoil, but are leaving Assad's
regime increasingly isolated.
Arab League ministers meeting in
the Gulf nation of Qatar on Saturday to finalize the bloc's penalties
agreed on a list of 19 Syrian officials subject to a travel ban. Among
them are Cabinet ministers, intelligence chiefs and security officers,
but the list does not include Assad.
Many of the Arab sanctions,
which were first announced last Sunday, went into effect immediately,
including cutting off transactions with the Syrian central bank, halting
Arab government funding for projects in Syria and freezing government
assets. Flights between Syria and its Arab neighbors will stop Dec. 15.
The Arab League also agreed to ban the supply of all weapons to Syria.
The worst violence on Saturday took place in the restive northwestern city of Idlib.
The
pre-dawn clashes between regime forces and defectors killed seven
soldiers and policemen, as well as five defectors and three civilians,
according to a British-based group of Syrian activists called the Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights.
Elsewhere, security forces killed
one civilian in the southern province of Daraa, six in the central
region of Homs and three others in areas near Idlib, the observatory
said.
The U.N.'s top human rights official said this week that
Syria is in a state of civil war and that more than 4,000 people have
been killed since March.
Until recently, most of the bloodshed in
Syria was caused by security forces firing on mainly peaceful
protesters, but there have been growing reports of army defectors and
armed civilians fighting regime forces.
November was the
deadliest month of the uprising, with at least 950 people killed in
gunbattles, raids and other violence, according to activist groups.
In
the west of the country, Syrian troops detained at least 27 people in
the village of Talkalakh on the border with Lebanon and set fire to the
homes of nine activists who were on the run, the observatory said.
Talkalakh
is within walking distance from Lebanon, and at least two Lebanese
civilians were struck by bullets on their side of the border on Friday.
Witnesses said that they had heard hours of explosions and heavy
machine-gun fire coming from the village.
The country's state-run
SANA news agency confirmed the arrests in Talkalakh, saying that those
detained were "terrorists" involved in smuggling weapons, drugs and
bringing in fighters from Lebanon. The regime has consistently blamed
armed gangs acting out a foreign conspiracy for Syria's unrest.
The
opposition activists reject that and say they are pushing for Assad's
ouster in hopes of breaking open the nation's closed political scene.
The
reports of new violence could not be independently confirmed. The
regime has sealed the country off from foreign journalists and prevented
independent reporting.
Syria has refused to accept an Arab
League proposal for ending the violence under which a team of Arab
monitors would enter the country to ensure the government has halted its
crackdown on protesters.
Arab League officials at Saturday's
meeting in Qatar said Syria has asked for a meeting to discuss the
proposed monitoring team with the league's secretary-general, Nabil
Elaraby. But no date or venue for those talks was announced.
The league suspended Syria's membership in November.
___
Associated Press writer Aya Batrawy contributed to this report from Cairo.
___
Bassem Mroue can be reached on http://twitter.com/bmroue
