Syria Said to Fire on Protest in Defiance of Global Rebuke
The deadly repression, in the face of rising international condemnation of Mr. Assad, suggested his own stubbornness was hardening. Syrians have been demonstrating on Fridays after noon prayers since the uprising began in March, and activists on the official Facebook page for the Syrian revolution were calling this week’s demonstrations “Friday of the beginnings of victory.” Activists and residents reached in Syria reported gunfire in several areas across <a href="http://www.trading666.com/brand-bags-t1-8.html"><strong>wholesale juicy handbags online</strong></a> the country, despite Mr. Assad’s assertion two days earlier that all military operations against the opposition had ended. They said that 15 demonstrators were killed in the southern Dara’a Province, where the first protests began five months ago after security forces arrested and tortured high school students caught scrawling antigovernment graffiti on walls. Among the dead in Dara’a were five army soldiers who refused to fire on protesters, according to the Local Coordination Committees, a group of activists who document and organize protests. They also said that two people died in the Damascus suburbs when their demonstrations came under fire, and that one person was killed in Homs, Syria’s third-largest city, where some of the biggest demonstrations against Mr. Assad’s government have occurred. The activists said security forces were using live ammunition against protesters in Latakia, on the Mediterranean coast, as well as in Homs and Aleppo. Residents also said that security forces arrested dozens of men who were leaving a mosque in Aleppo. Three people were killed on Thursday, activists said, during demonstrations held after an evening prayer performed only during Ramadan, a holy month when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. In Deir al-Zour, in eastern Syria, where military forces began an attack on protesters two weeks <a href="www.trading666.com"><strong>wholesale Cheap Replica Handbags from china </strong></a> ago, killing dozens, activists said that the Friday demonstration attracted a big crowd despite the heavy presence of security forces. “Today people felt more confident,” said Maamoun, an activist in Deir al-Zour. He said that demonstrators were chanting “The people want to execute the president” and that armed men loyal to the government chased them with batons. On Thursday, the international community, in a coordinated action led by President Obama, called on Mr. Assad to step down. Mr. Obama said in a statement released by the White House that the Syrian president’s “calls for dialogue and reform have rung hollow while he is imprisoning, torturing and slaughtering his own people.” The United States also banned all imports of Syrian oil and barred American citizens from having any dealings with Mr. Assad’s government. The top human rights official at the United Nations also released a report that accused Mr. Assad’s government of committing atrocities in its repression of the uprising, including summary executions and disappearances, and recommended that the <a href="http://www.trading666.com/others-brand-cigarettes-f2-66.html"><strong>wholesale marlboro lights cigarettes online </strong></a> Security Council refer the evidence to the International Criminal Court. The Syrian ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar Ja’afari, said the United States and other Western critics were engaged in a subversive plot to encourage what he called “terrorist armed groups,” the Assad government’s terminology for antigovernment protesters. An American ban on Syrian oil would not by itself be significant, but the Assad government would feel the effects of a European ban on oil from Syria, which exports more than a third of its annual production to Europe. The European Union took a significant step toward such a ban on Friday when senior diplomats in Brussels requested that plans be drawn up to stop all imports of Syrian crude oil. The diplomats also agreed to add 15 names of individuals or companies to the list of those already subjected to asset freezes or visa bans.
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