Arab League urged to be firm as Syrian toll rises

SYRIA’S opposition yesterday urged the Arab League to stand strong against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime as the United Nations said its crackdown on dissent has left more than 3,500 people dead.

In a letter, the Syrian National Council (SNC) urged the pan-Arab bloc “to take a strong and effective position against the Syrian regime commensurate with the dangerous development of the situation in Syria”.

Syria’s National Council, which groups the main opposition currents, focused its appeal on the central city of Homs, after declaring it a “humanitarian disaster area” in need of “international protection of civilians”.

Homs is the only major city to remain outside the regime’s control after military operations in Hama further north, Deir Ezzor in the east and the coastal cities of Latakia and Banias.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said two people, including a girl, were killed in Homs yesterday alone as soldiers pressed a military campaign in the Baba Amro neighbourhood.

And in Qusayr, near Homs, overnight clashes pitted soldiers against gunmen presumed to be defectors.

“Eight gunmen and security agents were killed in an ambush by armed men, probably army defectors,” south of Maaret al-Numan, near the border with Turkey.

The United Nations High Commission for Human Rights said yesterday that “more than 3,500” have been killed since March in the crackdown on dissent.

The Arab League has called an emergency meeting in Cairo on Saturday over Syria’s failure to implement its roadmap for ending the bloodshed, which calls on Assad to open talks with the opposition and withdraw tanks from the streets.