Syrian fire at border angers Turkey

THERE IS deepening concern that the conflict in Syria could spill across its borders, after Syrian troops yesterday fired at rebels who had taken taken sanctuary in a Turkish refugee camp, wounding three people.

The rebels had attacked a checkpoint, killing six security and customs officers, before fleeing to the refugee camp, reported the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Turkey protested at the border incident and summoned the Syrian envoy to demand a halt to such violence.

Six troops and a number of civilians were said to have been killed in other incidents and a Lebanese television news cameraman was shot dead on the Lebanese border.

Opposition activists said the military bombarded al-Latmana, northwest of the city of Hama, killing 30 people. Among the deadwere 17 children and eight women, they said.

The ceasefire by all forces, negotiated by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, was due to come into effect after Syrian troops completed their withdrawal from population centres. However, Damascus has refused to withdraw its troops until guarantees are given by the rebels that they will also withdraw and the flow of funds and arms to them is halted.

Although the incident at the refugee camp was the first cross-bor- der shooting involving Turkey, similar events have taken place in northern Lebanon, where rebels have launched attacks on government troops and targets.

Ankara has threatened to create a buffer zone on the Syrian side of the frontier where refugees and defectors would be protected by the Turkish army. However, providing a safe haven to armed elements mounting raids across the border could prompt an intensification of government military operations against villages and towns in the vicinity.

Ankara, which has said it will not act unilaterally, has been subjected to such raids by dissident Turkish Kurds based in Iraq and has repeatedly struck at them inside Iraq.

Turkish deputy foreign minister Naci Koru said the deadline for the withdrawal had become “void at this stage”. However, it is not clear where the disruption of Mr Annan’s phased plan leaves his mission.

Western powers that intervened militarily in Libya to overthrow Col Muammar Gadafy are reluctant to become involved in Syria while Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Qatar are prepared to aid the rebels but not to take military action.

Mr Annan is set to tour a refugee camp in Turkey today before flying to Tehran for consultations with the Iranian government, a staunch ally of the Syrian government.

He has already held discussions in Moscow and Beijing which have extended full support to his peace plan but rejected external military intervention aimed at ousting President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrian foreign minister Walid Muallem, now in Moscow, is due to meet his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, who has declared his government’s opposition to setting deadlines. While China has urged Syria to meet its commitments, Russia made no comment so far about Damascus’s refusal to abide by the Annan plan without rebel guarantees. Russia has said it will dispatch observers to Syria as part of a UN monitoring force.

Instead of reducing violence, Mr Annan’s deadlines have led to an escalation of attacks by government and rebel forces – the government determined to drive rebels from towns and villages and the rebels seeking to defend their strongholds and provoke the military to use brute force to crush them, thereby earning international condemnation.

In a 25-page report, In Cold Blood, Human Rights Watch (HRW) documents more than a dozen incidents since late 2011, among which was the execution by Syrian troops of more than 85 civilians, including women and children, who did not take part in fighting, and 16 captured rebel fighters. HRW said these deaths took place in Idlib and Homs provinces, many of them during intensive military operations in March.

Researcher Ole Solvang stated: “Syrian security forces will stop the executions only if they sense accountability is inevitable. It is up to the security council to send this message.”

HRW called on the council to “ensure that any UN mission man- dated to supervise” Mr Annan’s plan would document “such crimes” and recommended the deployment of human rights experts alongside monitors.

The organisation previously documented serious human rights abuses and killings carried out by rebels.