Thousands take to streets to test Syrian ceasefire

THOUSANDS OF Syrians took to the streets yesterday to test the government’s commitment to the ceasefire in response to opposition calls for protests after Friday prayers.

While Syrian forces responded with tear gas, firing into the air, and also with beatings, there were no reports that heavy weapons or snipers were used against protesters, and the UN-imposed ceasefire held for a second day in most of the country.

However, Reuters news agency reported that four protesters were shot dead and said an army officer was killed on the second day of a nationwide ceasefire meant to open a path to peaceful political dialogue after 13 months of extreme violence. At least three and perhaps as many as 15 protesters were shot dead, activists said.

Activists said security forces came out in strength in many cities to prevent protesters forming major anti-Assad rallies. A slogan carried by protesters in the Qadam district of Damascus said: “Bashar may be able to laugh at the whole world – except for the Syrian people”. Another said: “The new comedy is the ceasefire”.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the anti-Assad Local Co-ordination Committees said two people were killed as marchers tried to converge on a central square in the city of Hama.

In claims that could not be verified independently, it was reported that troops shot one person dead as worshippers left a mosque in Nawa in the southern Deraa province, where the uprising began. A third was killed by security forces in the town of Salqeen in the northwestern province of Idlib, they said, and a fourth was shot dead in the town of Deraya, in Damascus province.

Syria’s state news agency, Sana, blamed two of the deaths on the opposition, saying an “armed terrorist group” shot dead the man in Salqeen and attributed the death of the Hama protester to a shot fired by a fellow demonstrator. It also said “terrorists” shot dead an army major as he drove to work at his unit. Armed groups were seeking to “destroy any effort to find a political solution”, said Sana.

The most sustained breach of the truce apparently took place at the town of Khirbet al-Joz in the north on the Turkish border when Syrian troops provided covering fire to several of their number trying to take down five opposition flags flying from a position held by rebels who claimed they withdrew to avoid violating the truce.

Opposition sources also reported that demonstrators threw stones at security forces in the southern Deraa district, cradle of the 13-month revolt.

Ahmad Fawzi, spokesman for UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, said that in spite of shooting “here and there” the ceasefire, a key provision in his peace plan, was holding. Mr Annan’s “main concern is that the guns remain silent,” Mr Fawzi observed. “With every cessation of hostilities there will be skirmishes; this is not unusual, sometimes the parties test each other.

“There may be skirmishes for hours or even days, but the fact of the matter remains that heavy shelling . . . has died down.” He admitted that the presence of troops and tanks in cities, towns and villages, a violation of the Annan plan, remains a serious concern.

Meanwhile in New York, western powers brushed aside Russian criticism of a US-drafted UN Security Council resolution authorising an advance team of observers to monitor the ceasefire.

The missions of Britain, France and Germany said the resolution would be co-sponsored by Britain, France, Germany, Portugal and Morocco, the sole Arab nation on the council. The draft calls for the initial deployment of up to 30 unarmed UN observers in line with a request by Mr Annan.

Russia’s UN ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, who had criticised an earlier version of the US text, presented the 15-nation council with his own draft that Moscow would prefer to vote on. “We had this understanding yesterday that it should be to the point, pragmatic, specific about putting in boots on the ground, [an] advance party of the monitoring team.”

It was not clear if a text could be agreed to be voted on yesterday.

One diplomat said he doubted if the vote would come before today. – (Reuters)