Syrian troops shot dead four villagers on Wednesday, an activist said, as authorities pressed on with a tank-led assault that has already driven thousands of refugees across the northwest border with Turkey.
“The four died in random firing on the village of Rama from tank machineguns, which has become customary in these unjustified assaults.
The tanks started firing on surrounding woods then directed their fire on the village,” Ammar Qarabi, president of the Syrian National Human Rights Organisation, told Reuters from exile in Cairo. The assault on Jabal al-Zawya, a region 35 km (22 miles) south of Turkey that has seen spreading protests against Assad’s 11-year rule was launched overnight, a day after the authorities said they would invite opponents to talks on July 10 to set a framework for a dialogue promised by President Bashar al-Assad. Opposition leaders have dismissed the offer, saying it is not credible while mass killings and arrests continue. The Local Coordination Committees, a main activists’ group, said in a statement on Wednesday that 1,000 people have been arrested arbitrarily across Syria over the last week alone.
“Jabal al-Zawya, was one of the first regions in Syria where people took to street demanding the downfall of the regime. The military attacks have now reached them and they will likely result in more killings and in more refugees to Turkey,” said Qarabi, who is from the northwestern province of Idlib. A resident of Jabal al-Zawya said he heard heavy explosions overnight around the villages of Rama and Orum al-Joz, west of the highway linking the cities of Hama and Aleppo.
Another resident said 30 tanks went to Jabal al-Zawya on Monday from the village of Bdama on the Turkish border, where troops broke into houses and burnt crops. Rights campaigners say Assad’s troops, security forces and gunmen have killed over 1,300 civilians since the uprising for political freedom erupted in the southern Hauran Plain in March, including over 150 people killed in a scorched earth campaign against towns and villages in Idlib.
