Tanks Thursday swooped on another northern town as Syria’s army pressed its crackdown on dissent and the United States condemned the “outrageous use of violence” to quell a popular uprising.“Dozens of tanks, armoured cars, personnel carriers and army trucks have been deployed at entrance points to Khan Sheikhun, and soldiers have started going in” to the northwest town near Hama, said rights activist Rami Abdel Rahman.
The head of the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reached by telephone, also said the military had cut the Aleppo-Damascus road with barricades.
Another activist, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said that on June 5, “two tanks of the Syrian army were burned by the residents of Khan Sheikhun.” Pro-democracy activists, meanwhile, called for new Friday protests against the ruling Baath party in a day dedicated to Saleh al-Ali, a hero of the Syrian revolution who fought against French occupation in 1918.
The Khan Sheikhun deployment marks a continuation of military operations in the northern province of Idlib, where forces have targeted Ariha, Maaret al-Nooman, Jisr al-Shughur and its surroundings, an activist said.
A leading Turkish newspaper reported on Thursday that Turkish forces may enter Syria to create a military buffer zone if the unrest there degenerates. Commenting on an article he wrote in the daily Posta newspaper, prominent journalist Mehmet Ali Birand said a civil war in Syria could force up to 200,000 thousand people to flee towards Turkey. “The UN would become involved, and Turkey would be obligated to close its border and create a buffer zone,” with its army, he told AFP. “This option was raised at the highest level, some time ago.”
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who did not confirm the report, said Ankara would supply humanitarian aid to thousands of Syrian refugees.
“There are at present more than 10,000 people just over our border, on the other side of the barbed wire,” he told journalists.
“We have decided to help our Syrian brothers to meet their urgent needs for food,” Davutoglu said a day after visiting refugee camps set up by the Red Crescent in Hatay province, adding that the Syrian authorities had been informed.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan met President Bashar al-Assad’s envoy Hassan Turkmani for nearly three hours on Wednesday in an apparent fresh effort to persuade Damascus to change course.
No statement was made after the Ankara talks. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Tuesday said the violence has claimed the lives of 1,297 civilians and 340 security force members since it began in mid-March. Observers say the crackdown is being spearheaded by Assad’s brother Maher, who heads the elite Fourth Division.
Washington urged an immediate end to the crackdown.
