The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Arab League says Syria monitors are helping
- Egyptians head to polls again in parliament vote
- Five hurt in Cyprus in protest over British bases
| Arab League says Syria monitors are helping Posted: 02 Jan 2012 03:58 PM PST BEIRUT (Reuters) - The head of the Arab League has said its peace monitors are helping to ease a violent crackdown on anti-government protests in Syria, but urged President Bashar al-Assad's government to carry out a peace plan in full.
Meanwhile army defectors whose armed insurgency has threatened to overshadow the peaceful popular uprising captured dozens of members of the security forces by seizing two checkpoints Monday, the opposition said. Army defectors also clashed with security forces at a third checkpoint, killing and wounding an unspecified number of troops loyal to Assad, opposition activists said. Assad is struggling to defeat a popular uprising and avoid becoming the latest leader to be toppled by "Arab Spring" revolutions, after those of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen. After nearly 10 months of violence in which the United Nations says more than 5,000 people have been killed, mostly unarmed civilians, an Arab League monitoring mission has spent the past week assessing Assad's compliance with a peace plan. Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby said Monday that Syria's military had now withdrawn from residential areas and was on the outskirts of the cities, but gunfire continued and snipers were still a threat. "The latest telephone report said there is gunfire from different places, which makes it hard to say who is shooting who," Elaraby said in Cairo. "Gunfire should be stopped and there are snipers." "We call upon the Syrian government to fully commit to what it promised." PEACE PLAN The League's plan calls for Assad to pull troops and tanks from the streets, free detainees and talk to his opponents. Elaraby said the monitors had secured the release of 3,484 prisoners and succeeded in getting food supplies into Homs, one of the centres of the violence. "Give the monitoring mission the chance to prove its presence on the ground," he said. But many Syrian opposition activists are sceptical that the mission can put real pressure on Assad to halt the violence. Sunday, the Arab Parliament, an 88-member committee of delegates from each of the League's member states, called for the monitors to leave Syria, saying their mission was providing cover for unabated violence and abuses by the government. Two people were killed by gunfire in Homs Monday, and the bodies of another two were handed over to their families, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Security forces killed a farmer in Douma, on the northeastern edge of Damascus, as they carried out raids searching for suspects wanted by authorities, it said. TAKING RISKS Kinan Shami, a member of the Syrian Revolution Coordinating Union activists' group, said from Damascus that people were taking huge risks by gathering in cities where Arab League monitors were expected, in the hope of talking to them. "People expected them in Daraya yesterday on New Year's Day and thousands went to the main square, raised the Independence Flag on a mast and gathered around it. Security forces shot at them and killed two protesters," Shami said. "The people are trying to show the monitors the repression and are risking their lives to meet them because everywhere they go the monitors are surrounded by security... Other than getting arrested and beaten or killed, they could easily face endless counts of treason and communicating with foreign powers." But Issam Ishak, a senior member of the main opposition Syrian National Council, said the monitors must be given a chance. "Their presence is helping further erode the fear factor and is encouraging the expansion of the protests." The reported attacks on military checkpoints came three days after the anti-government Free Syrian Army said it had ordered its fighters to stop offensive operations while it tried to arrange a meeting with the Arab League delegates. Rami Abdelrahman, director of the Observatory, said Monday's operation had taken place in the northern province of Idlib. It was not immediately clear how many people had been killed or captured by the rebels. The government bars most foreign journalists from operating in Syria, making it difficult to verify witness accounts. Assad blames the unrest on foreign-backed armed Islamists who officials say have killed 2,000 security personnel. The state news agency SANA said a worker at a school in the city of Hama had been killed by armed men who captured her three days ago after her husband, who worked at the same school, refused their demands that he leave his job. SANA also said a journalist working for state radio had died Monday from wounds sustained when gunmen shot him several days ago in Daraya, in Damascus province. (Additional reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman; writing by Mark Trevelyan and Kevin Liffey; editing by Jon Boyle) Copyright © 2012 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. | ||
| Egyptians head to polls again in parliament vote Posted: 02 Jan 2012 03:19 PM PST CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptians vote Tuesday in the third round of a parliamentary election that has so far handed Islamists the biggest share of seats in an assembly that will be central in the transition from army rule.
Islamist groups came late to the uprising that unseated president Hosni Mubarak in February, but were well placed to seize the moment when Egyptians were handed the first chance in six decades to choose their representatives freely. The run-up to the third round has been overshadowed by the deaths of 17 people last month in clashes between the army and protesters demanding the military step aside immediately. But the ruling generals have insisted the election process will not be derailed by violence. Monitors mostly praised the first two rounds as free of the ballot stuffing, thuggery and vote rigging that once guaranteed landslide wins for Mubarak's party. But police raids on pro-democracy and rights groups last week have disrupted the work of leading Western-backed election monitors and drew accusations that the army was deliberately trying to weaken oversight of the vote and silence critics. The government said the raids were part of a probe into illegal foreign funding of political parties and not aimed at weakening rights groups, which have been among the fiercest critics of the army's turbulent rule. Nevertheless, Washington called on the Egyptian government to halt "harassment" of the groups involved. The U.S.-funded International Republican Institute said it had been invited by Egypt government to monitor the election and did not give funding to political parties or civic groups. It urged the government to let staff return to their offices and obtain the official registration they had long requested. "There is no reason not to allow IRI to assess the elections," the IRI said in a statement Monday. FIERCE RIVALRY Citizens thronged the polls in unprecedented numbers in the first two rounds and parties ranging from hardline Islamists to liberals and secularists are competing hard for every vote. Liberals accuse groups like the Muslim Brotherhood and the hardline Islamist Al-Nour party, which surprised with a strong showing in earlier rounds, of flouting a ban on religious slogans in politics and telling voters their rivals are ungodly. "We have been trying to tell people in our campaign before the third stage that we respect religions," said Mohamed Abu Hamed, Secretary General of the liberal Free Egyptians party. Islamists in turn accuse one of the party's top figures, Coptic Christian business tycoon Naguib Sawiris, of using his media empire to mount a disinformation campaign against them. The Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) "demands from media outlets, especially those owned by businessmen who ... still have interests with the previous regime, to remain objective and stop distorting this experience, which people have been waiting for a long time," the FJP said in a statement. Although Islamists command a majority of seats contested so far, fierce rivalry among the various Islamist groups offers scope for liberals to wield influence in the parliament, which will play a role in defining a new constitution for Egypt. But the strong showing by religious parties has sown unease among Western powers that only disowned Mubarak once his three-decade rule was crumbling. Mubarak painted his government as a modernising bulwark against Islamist extremists who threatened Egypt's future prosperity and its peace treaty with neighbour Israel. The Brotherhood, which built a broad grass-roots support base through decades of charity work among millions of poor Egyptians, insists it will do nothing to weaken Egypt's economy further or sow social chaos. That message of stability has found resonance among ordinary Egyptians tired of almost a year of political turmoil and fearful for their livelihoods as the economy wallows in crisis. The concluding vote to the lower house of parliament takes in regions of the rural south, which has the largest proportions of Christian voters, the industrial Nile Delta region north of the capital Cairo, and the restive Sinai desert region to the east. Fourteen million eligible voters in nine regions will choose who occupies 150 of the seats in parliament. The army, under pressure to hasten the handover to civilian rule, issued a decree Sunday to shorten the forthcoming upper house election to two rounds from three. Copyright © 2012 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. | ||
| Five hurt in Cyprus in protest over British bases Posted: 02 Jan 2012 01:11 PM PST NICOSIA (Reuters) - At least five people were injured and two arrested during a protest against the presence of British military bases in Cyprus late Monday, witnesses said. Fighting broke out between Cypriot demonstrators and police guarding RAF Akrotiri, a sprawling compound on the southern tip of the eastern Mediterranean island. According to a spokesperson for the bases, four civilian police officers employed to guard the bases were injured along with a television cameraman who was hit by a rock. Local media also reported injuries among demonstrators, some of whom threw rocks and sticks at the entrance of the tightly-guarded compound. Britain has held sovereignty over two bases since Cyprus gained independence from London in 1960. The existence of British bases is regarded by many Cypriots as an unwelcome colonial remnant, though protests against their continued presence have waned in recent years. London has given no sign it intends to hand them over. Last month British Defense Minister Philip Hammond confirmed London's "enduring commitment" to the bases, saying they had proved their worth during air operations in Libya and as a logistic hub for activities in Afghanistan. The RAF base at Akrotiri plus the army barracks at Dhekelia in the east together cover 98 sq miles (254 sq km) of Cyprus, or around 3 percent of its landmass. (Reporting By Michele Kambas; Editing by Ben Harding) Copyright © 2012 Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
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