The Philippine government says Syrian rebels have failed to release 21 Filipino UN peacekeepers and stuck to their demands for repositioning of Syrian government forces before any handover. A spokesman for the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs said the rebels had been expected to free the troops early on Friday.
“I don’t know exactly know what happened, why the expected release did not happen, but the demand is still there” for the Syrian forces to pull back, Raul Hernandez told reporters in Manila.
The troops were seized on Wednesday near the Syrian village of Jamlah, just a kilometre from the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, where the UN force has patrolled a ceasefire line between Israel and Syria for nearly four decades.
Hernandez said that the Philippine government continues to “work with all stakeholders for the expeditious release of our Filipino UN peacekeepers”.
Rebels said, however, that no talks were under way to free the men.
“There are no negotiations between any parties,” said Abu Essam Taseel, from the media office of the group calling itself the Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade. He said the captives would only be released once President Bashar al-Assad’s forces retreated from around Jamlah and halted bombing there.
“Negotiations should be between [the United Nations] and the regime of Bashar al-Assad to stop the bombing and lift the blockade of the area so it can be safe,” Taseel said.
The Philippine military had earlier said that rebels wanted the Red Cross to escort the captives out of the area.
The peacekeepers said in videos posted online that they were being treated well.
“We cannot go home because the government of Assad do not stop the bombing. To our family, we hope to see you soon and we are OK here,” they said.
A second video showed six peacekeepers sitting in a room. An officer, who identified himself as a captain said that as their convoy came under shelling on Wednesday, “we stopped and civilian people helped us for our safety and distributed us in different places to keep us safe”.Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967.
The captive troops are part of a 300-strong Philippine contingent to a UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) that has been monitoring the separation of Israeli and Syrian troops since the 1974 armistice that followed the previous year’s Middle East war, in which Syria tried to retake Golan.
