The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Syrian forces fire at mourners, battle defectors
- Bangkok braces but safe so far from floods
- Libya's new rulers contend with pro-Gaddafi district
| Syrian forces fire at mourners, battle defectors Posted: 15 Oct 2011 09:42 PM PDT AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian security forces shot dead three mourners and injured 20 on Saturday when they fired on a protester funeral procession in central Damascus while troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad fought army defectors west of the capital, witnesses said.
In his latest move to try and defuse discontent, part of a wave of popular unrest against repressive autocrats across the Arab world, Assad formed a committee to draft a new constitution within four months, the official news agency SANA said. The move raised the possibility that a clause designating his Baath Party, which seized power in a 1963 coup, as "leader of the state and society" could be scrapped. In a sign of growing regional pressure on Assad to undertake genuine reform after seven months of street protests, al Jazeera television said Arab foreign ministers would hold an emergency meeting on Sunday in Cairo to discuss the crisis in Syria. Gulf Arab states had earlier called for an immediate meeting of the Arab League to discuss the humanitarian situation in Syria and study ways to stop the bloodshed. Assad has sent troops and tanks into restive cities and towns to try put down the unrest but protests have persisted, spreading to suburbs and rural regions around cities as troops have occupied main squares in urban centres. The president blames the violence on foreign-backed "armed terrorist groups" who authorities say have killed 1,100 soldiers and police. The United Nations said the military crackdown on unrest has killed 3,000 people, including at least 187 children. With the deployment of thousands of police and militiamen loyal to Assad, whose family has ruled Syria for 41 years, central neighbourhoods of Damascus have remained largely free of pro-democracy demonstrations. But at Saturday's funeral for a ten-year-old boy, Ibrahim Sheiban, killed in a protest rally the day before, "passions were running high," said one of the witnesses, a private sector employee who asked not to be identified for his own protection. "The body was wrapped in white and thousands behind it were chanting 'the people want the execution of the president' and 'we will be free despite you Bashar'," he said. Some mourners began throwing stones at the security forces, who fired back with live ammunition, the witness told Reuters by phone from the scene in the Damascus district of Maidan. INTERNATIONAL OUTRAGE The killings in Maidan brought to at least nine the number of people killed while protesting against Assad in the last 48 hours, according to rights activists. A human rights organisation said Assad's forces on Saturday also shot dead a prominent activist in eastern Syria who helped organise peaceful demonstrations in the region after a military crackdown on unrest two months ago. Ziad al-Obeidi, 42, was killed as he fled from security police who stormed his home in the provincial capital of Deir al-Zor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. There was no comment from the Syrian authorities, who do issue statements on individual killings but deny assassinating their opponents. "Ziad was adamant that non-violence was the only way to counter the regime's bloodletting. He had three kids and barely enough money to put bread on the table, yet the authorities keep saying that this uprising is being lead by foreign-backed armed terrorists," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told Reuters by telephone from Britain. The United Nations called on Friday for international protection for civilians from a crackdown it said could kindle civil war between Syria's majority Sunni Muslims and members of Assad's minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Sunnis also comprise most of the army's rank and file while the officer corps is comprised primarily of Alawites effectively under the command of Assad's younger brother, Maher. The authorities have expelled most independent media from Syria, make it difficult to verify accounts of events. "The onus is on all members of the international community to take protective action in a collective manner, before the continual ruthless repression and killings drive the country into a full-blown civil war," the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said in a statement. "As more members of the military refuse to attack civilians and change sides, the crisis is already showing worrying signs of descending into an armed struggle," she added. Assad was quoted by state media this week as saying Syria had "passed the most difficult stage" of the uprising. But opposition leaders say the mounting death toll will only turn more Syrians against the 46-year old president. In the Zabani Plain, around 35 km (22 miles) west of Damascus on the fringes of the Anti-Lebanon mountain range, army defectors fought loyalist troops for several hours on Saturday, according to local residents. "I saw army jeeps towing two (vehicles) belonging to State Security that were riddled with bullets. Blood was practically seeping from them," said a resident of the resort town, who gave his name as Mohammad. "They ransacked houses in Zabadani overnight looking for deserters and activists." TINKERING WITH LAWS Sticking to a strategy of dismissing the protests as a foreign plot to divide Syria while touting "reforms that safeguard Syria's sovereignty", Assad formed a committee on Saturday to draft a new constitution within four months. "President Assad issued today decree number 33 which stipulates forming a committee to prepare for a draft constitution," the official news agency agency SANA said. The constitution, which was changed by Assad's late father, President Hafez al-Assad, in the 1970s, discourages any political pluralism by stipulating that the ruling Baath Party is "leader of the state and society." The Syrian opposition has called for the clause to be scrapped, along with another that says the president can only be nominated by his Baath Party as well as numerous laws passed in the last 50 years which they say allow Assad and his security apparatus to practice repression and corruption with impunity. New laws issued by Assad in the past three months permit "parties committed to democratic principles" and established an election commission. But they also preserved quotas that retain the majority of seats for farmers and workers, whose representatives are drawn from state-controlled unions. Syria's current parliament, a rubber stamp body, does not have a single opposition figure. (Editing by Mark Heinrich) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. | ||
| Bangkok braces but safe so far from floods Posted: 15 Oct 2011 09:42 PM PDT BANGKOK (Reuters) - Relief workers reinforced barriers on Sunday to help defend Thailand's capital, Bangkok, from the country's worst floods in half a century and efforts were stepped up to protect a huge industrial estate to the city's north.
Despite heavy rain in parts of Bangkok late on Saturday, areas inside the defensive system of dikes and canals have so far been spared the flooding that has devastated a third of the country, killing at least 297 people and causing about $3 billion in damage. The north, northeast and centre of Thailand have been worst hit and Bangkok -- much of it only two metres (6.5 ft) above sea level -- is at risk as water overflows from reservoirs in the north, swelling the Chao Phraya river that winds through the densely populated and low-lying city. The river was reported to be at a record high level of 2.15 metres (seven feet) at one point on Saturday but the embankment wall running along it in inner Bangkok is at least 2.5 metres high and has been raised along vulnerable stretches. Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has sought to reassure residents they should be safe but people have still stocked up on bottled water, instant noodles, rice and canned goods, emptying shelves in some major markets. Many have parked their cars in elevated garages and piled sandbags in front of shop-houses and homes. Water from the north approached Bangkok over the weekend, coinciding with high estuary tides that hamper the flow of water into the sea. "We will protect strategic areas and the heart of the economy such as industrial zones, the central part of all provinces and the Thai capital as well as Suvarnabhumi Airport, industrial estates and evacuation centres," Yingluck said on Saturday, referring to Bangkok's main international airport. On Sunday, the focus was on Nava Nakorn industrial estate in Pathum Thani province north of Bangkok, which is standing in the way of one flow of water towards the capital. Thai media reported that some 600 soldiers and workers from the estate, Thailand's oldest with more than 200 factories, were working round the clock to strengthen its walls and divert water. Nation TV reported that water was just 10 cm (four4 inches) below the top of the estate's 4.5 metres high wall. Ayutthaya, Pathum Thani and Nakhon Sawan provinces north of Bangkok have been devastated. Floods have swallowed up homes and swamped three huge industrial parks, including the Bang Pa-In estate on Saturday in Ayutthaya. Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co Ltd has shut its Ayutthaya plant, which accounts for 4.7 percent of its global output, and says it will stay closed until Oct. 21. (Additional reporting by Jutarat Skulpichetrat and Pracha Hariraksapitak; Writing by Alan Raybould; Editing by Nick Macfie) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. | ||
| Libya's new rulers contend with pro-Gaddafi district Posted: 15 Oct 2011 08:40 PM PDT TRIPOLI (Reuters) - The armed men wearing the colours of Libya's new government are everywhere, eyes darting side to side, some edgy, others excited, as they train anti-aircraft guns on Tripoli's most pro-Gaddafi neighbourhood.
But one local man takes a chance down a quiet side street. Pulling his car up alongside a foreign journalist, he jumps out with a message he wants to get across: "Gaddafi was better." He is nervous and his hands are shaking. Because he speaks little English he points to his pregnant wife in the car, who has a small girl playing on her lap and another beside her. "Gaddafi," she says with a thumbs-up. "Now no good, no water, no food for baby, nothing." Her husband rubs her belly. "Nothing," he repeats in Arabic. The Tripoli district of Abu Salim remains a hotbed of support for Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's ousted leader. Abu Salim was the last area of Tripoli to fall to the forces of the now-ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) as they swept into the capital. And it was the scene on Friday of fierce gunbattles between NTC fighters and dozens of Gaddafi loyalists hiding in its tower block jungle. Though the clashes were small and isolated, they were the first since Tripoli fell to the NTC on Aug. 23 and have left many wondering whether a pro-Gaddafi insurgency is possible. NTC officials are keen to play that scenario down, with "just a small problem" a regular refrain. But on Saturday, scores of NTC fighters, laden down with machineguns, rocket-propelled grenades and heavy weapons, circled the complex of flats where the violence was centred, indicating that the incident is one the country's fledgling rulers are taking seriously. "We didn't like the way the NTC came yesterday, shooting at everything and everyone who was moving," a 20-year-old resident who identified himself as Mohammed told Reuters. "I support this revolution but acting like this -- one of them even tried to steal a car here yesterday -- will turn people in these areas against them." NTC fighters conducted house-to-house searches on Saturday, clambering up the walls of the tower blocks that house some of Tripoli's poorest inhabitants, peering into water tanks looking for concealed weapons. "Gaddafi's people came here and handed out weapons to everyone during the war," Ali, a mechanic, said. "Every weapon you can imagine that a hand could carry, they gave us." KILLED FOR A POINT OF VIEW? Mohammed and his friends said the government fighters had arrested and taken away one woman because they found a green Gaddafi flag in her flat, and that they had shot a man dead for shouting pro-Gaddafi slogans last week. Neither claim could be immediately verified. "It's expressing an opinion," Mohammed said. "Simply that. And you get killed? It's wrong." The conduct of the armed men, many of them very young, now responsible for Libya's security is of growing concern to human rights groups, who have accused them of mistreating thousands of pro-Gaddafi detainees and urged that they distance themselves from the crimes of the previous regime. NTC officials appeal for patience and say it will take some time to set up a functioning judiciary, that fighters will be trained as police, that the new state will be a democracy with full respect for human rights. But some analysts fear that resentment may fester in places like Abu Salim and boil over into more bloodshed. Still, many people around the neighbourhood on Saturday professed themselves happy that Gaddafi was gone, some saying he was the reason the area had been poor for so long. "I work for an oil company," Mohammed said. "I know how much money there is in Libya. I know the riches. But we didn't get any of them here. I saw no riches for myself." Other NTC supporters said that, while it was true that many in Abu Salim and in other traditionally pro-Gaddafi areas were sorry that he was gone after 42 years in power, they did not expect much more trouble from them. "The few Gaddafi supporters who are left will see that he has run away (into hiding)," said Saleh, a shop owner. "When they see that, they will have to join the new Libya so that we have no gunbattles in future." As he spoke, NTC fighters unleashed a volley of anti-aircraft fire, sending it over the roofs of the flats -- a warning and a show of strength for any hostile residents inside. Some children playing nearby did not flinch at all. (Editing by Mark Heinrich and Janet Lawrence) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
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