Syrian dissidents create 'National Alliance' against regime
December 15, 2011 05:13 PM
Agence France Presse
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2011/Dec-15/156985-syrian-dissidents-create-national-alliance-against-regime.ashx
ISTANBUL: A group claiming to represent the majority of the opposition movements inside Syria declared Thursday the foundation of a "National Alliance" of revolutionary forces aiming to topple the regime.
"The regime has killed, maimed, arrested, tortured and displaced tens of thousands of people," Muhammad Bessam Imadi, a former Syrian ambassador to Sweden, told a press conference in Istanbul.
"Therefore different revolutionary groups sought to unify their operational and political leadership to join forces and overthrow the regime," added Imadi, who described himself as head of the alliance.
"Now that the time is ripe, it has become necessary to declare our existence publicly. Therefore, we announce the National Alliance of Forces, Coordinators and Councils of the Syrian Revolution; Al-Leeqa," he said, reading a statement.
The former diplomat said Al-Leeqa includes "the majority of revolutionary groups conducting the revolution in Syria."
"We have managed to gather all these groups under the same umbrella," he said.
The Syrian National Council (SNC), which has brought together dissidents from inside and outside Syria, has recognised Al-Leeqa as one of its components.
Imadi told reporters that Al-Leeqa supported the Free Syrian Army, a grouping of army deserters that has taken up arms against the forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, "as long as it protects civilians and the peaceful revolution in Syria."
Questioned by AFP, Imadi said Al-Leeqa was a stucture uniting most of the local coordination committees in Syria, which were organizing protest movements in districts and cities.
"Only a small number of local coordination committees were represented" in the SNC, Imadi said, adding that the SNC then "lost contact with local revolutionary movements in Syria," implying that they would re-establish that tie.
(omitted)
الخارجية: محمد بسام العمادي صرف من الخدمة لأعمال الغش والتحايل خلال عمله سفيراً لسورية في السويد
Foreign Ministry: al-Imadi Dismissed from Work Due to Acts
Dec 15, 2011
http://www.sana.sy/ara/2/2011/12/15/388459.htm
http://www.sana.sy/eng/21/2011/12/15/388523.htm
DAMASCUS, SANA_ Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said Thursday it is not usual for the Ministry to comment on an issue related to a former employee, but in light of the interview conducted by the "Times" newspaper with Muhammad Bassam Imadi, Syria's former Ambassador to Sweden, the Ministry made it clear that the former employee al-Imadi committed violations and crimes resulted in his dismissal from his post for acts of deceit, fraud, trickery and exploiting his position for getting financial gains from the public money through his work as an ambassador for his country in Sweden.
The Ministry noted that it had started the investigation with al-Imadi since 2008 and was transferred to Damascus in the ninth month of the same year for continuing the investigation in his crimes and prosecuting him.
The Ministry made it clear that it proposed dismissing him and seizing his properties and that was done by the Prime Ministers' decision on March3, 2010.
"Joining of a person enjoying such moral values like al-Imadi to the Syrian opposition clarifies to the public opinion the fact that those who call themselves the opposition abroad." The Ministry said.
Syrian refugees lament losses in Turkey border village
December 15, 2011 12:52 AM
By Suleiman al-Khalidi
Reuters
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2011/Dec-15/156927-syrian-refugees-lament-losses-in-turkey-border-village.ashx
GUVECCI, Turkey: From the roof of his cousin's house across the border, Syrian villager Ahmad Sadeq can see two Syrian soldiers strolling around the farm he abandoned four months ago to seek safety with Turkish relatives.
Sadeq laments how nine months of unrest in Syria have shattered his once tranquil existence as the owner of more than 50 acres of orchards producing bountiful crops of apples, apricots and olives in Khirbet al-Jouz.
The Sadeqs were among thousands of terrified villagers who streamed into Turkey from northwest Syria since June, when President Bashar Assad launched an offensive to quell anti-government protests in his town.
"The army is in my house because I am wanted for a lot of things. We are closest to Turkey. We lived on the apple harvest and sent it to Al-Hall market in Aleppo," said Sadeq, 48, referring to Syria's second city, further from the border.
"We were living a life that made us not in need of anyone," said Sadeq, whose family of 11 is now crammed into a room next to his cousin's home in the sleepy border village.
The area, which became part of the French mandate of Syria after the 1923 collapse of the Ottoman Empire and was then given to Turkey in 1939, now shelters around 8,000 Syrian refugees, mostly living in five camps set up by the Turkish government.
The villagers, from Syria's majority Sunni community, say they face certain danger if they go back to the homes they fled when militiamen known as shabbiha from the minority Alawite sect raided their villages and towns.
"There is no security and no choice or way out except to stay here, because if one leaves, one gets killed," said Atef Kareem, 32, a plumber from the nearby town of Ain al-Baida. "Any security agent can do whatever he wants and kill you or cut you in pieces and no one will hold him accountable."
Many took the same path across the border that thousands of survivors of the massacre of the city Hama in 1982 took when they fled Syria. Assad's father, President Hafez Assad, then sent troops to crush an Islamist uprising in the city Hama.
The old and young refugees pass their long days trading news and watching Syrian troops and snipers perched in hillside watchtowers overlooking the valley, ready to do whatever it takes to prevent more Syrians from fleeing.
"Look at the snipers on hills and mountain tops," said Musa Alawi, pointing to a tall building above the thin asphalt road marking what was once a lightly patrolled border.
Villagers recount how a mother was killed and her husband and two children were wounded when they tried, and failed, to join relatives in Turkey last month.
The serenity of the countryside belies the tensions building up around the Turkish village of Guvecci, where word of mouth spreads talk of more troops and tanks deployed and trenches dug in forests and valleys.
"The Syrians are more afraid of us than those inside because the people can hit and run back and even smuggle weapons. They have dug trenches in the mountains behind the border and concealed more tanks," said Ibrahim Said, 21, a teacher from Jabal al-Zaywa.
Glued to the television, Ahmad Soufan, 42, a farmer from Janoudieh several kilometers away, fumes at what he sees as foot-dragging by Turkey in setting up a safe zone inside Syria.
Turkey has been one of the most vocal critics of Assad's crackdown and has made clear that if the situation gets worse it will push for international backing to set up a protected buffer zone for Syrians fleeing a humanitarian crisis.
Like many other refugees, Soufan believes only such a zone will protect thousands of Syrians in danger.
"Assad is killing 20 or 30 people every day. Every day action is delayed, more innocent lives are lost," he said.
Braving intermittent gunfire by soldiers shooting at night, some local villagers and army defectors do venture across the border under cover of darkness, taking well-trodden foot paths to check on their property and plantations.
Defectors also go on reconnaissance missions for the Free Syrian Army, a loose collection of army deserters believed to be operating a command post and headquarters in a heavily protected facility not far away.
Refugees worry that informers hang around trying to find out where the activists are, a constant reminder that they are still not completely safe.
"Here I don't think they can do anything, but they send them to know what's happening and ask about us," said Abu Fahed, who fled his village of Al-Kastan after his brother's body was dumped near his home five days following his detention by Syrian security forces.
The relationships between the communities on the two sides of the border are strong, linked by history, family and tradition.
"We are brothers. It's the borders that divided us, we never moved or came from anywhere. When they drew the borders this area became Turkey," said Arfan Subhi, 58, a dairy cattle farmer who sheltered his daughter, son-in-law and their family from Khirbet al-Jouz.
Subhi recollected his daughter Nasseema's marriage to her Syrian cousin in better days when they crossed the border on foot. Many on the Turkish side have offered extra rooms or employed their relatives as farm laborers to help them manage.
"What is happening pains us deeply. I don't want our Syrian brothers' dignity violated and with everything I own I will welcome him and help him because he is my brother in religion," said Fadel Fizo, whose relatives live in Damascus and Aleppo.
Still, the people from both sides who have been caught up in the crisis are showing the strain.
A thriving black market smuggling everything from cigarettes to cheap fuel and even cows from Syria has now come to a halt.
"We are all eating from our savings," said Ammar Abdullah, a civil servant in the town of Jabal al-Zawya, who moved in with his Turkish uncle and complains how expensive Turkey is.
Nabil Zaid, from the border village of Al-Shughr, said: "We have moved from a life that was difficult to a more difficult one here."
No comments:
Post a Comment