Syrian forces mounting raids on dissidents killed at least three civilians on Tuesday, rights groups said, after Damascus accused the West of trying to break up the country with “total chaos.” Meanwhile, China expressed its concern at the wider implications of the violence in Syria, even as the United States pressed Beijing, a veto-wielding member of the Security Council, to back stronger UN action against Damascus.
And the US State Department praised the restraint of protesters so far, while warning it was seeing signs that opponents of President Bashar al-Assad’s embattled regime were turning to violence. In the latest unrest, a human rights group said security forces killed at least three people and made several arrests on Tuesday in a sweep on political dissidents in the far north and deep south. “Two civilians were killed in Kafaruma district in the (northern) town of Jabal al-Zawiya during raids conducted by the security forces,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
In Daraa, the southern province where the protests began in mid-March, “a civilian was killed at dawn on Tuesday and five others wounded by gunfire from security forces” during a raid in Tafas village. Elsewhere in Daraa, nine people were arrested during a similar operation in the town of Tsila, said the Britain-based Observatory. A day after four soldiers were reportedly shot dead trying to desert in northwestern Idlib city, the Observatory said security forces raked the central city of Rastan with machine-gun fire at sunrise.
“At least 20 people were wounded, seven seriously, when soldiers using heavy machine guns on tanks began to open fire at sunrise in Rastan,” it said, adding that “loud explosions were also heard.” The Local Coordination Committees, which organises protests on the ground, reported a “massive deployment” of security forces in Rastan. The Observatory also reported witnesses saying sustained automatic gunfire was heard on Tuesday morning at Talbisseh, 10 kilometres south of Rastan.
And at Tir Maala, also in central Homs province, intense firing was heard late in the morning, it said. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem, speaking at the annual UN General Assembly, said foreign governments sought to undermine the co-existence among Syria’s different religious groups. “How can we otherwise explain media provocations, financing and arming religious extremism,” he asked.
