Syrian Freedom

#Syrian government spokesman flees country, diplomat says

03/12/12

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis and Erika Solomon

CAIRO/BEIRUT (Reuters) - A Syrian foreign ministry spokesman, who was the most public face of Bashar al-Assad’s government as it battled a 20-month-old uprising, has defected and fled the country, a diplomat in the region said on Monday.

Jihad al-Makdissi, who is in his 40s, previously worked at the Syrian embassy in London and returned to Damascus a year ago to serve as spokesman for the ministry, defending the government’s crackdown on the revolt against Assad’s rule.

He had little influence in a system largely run by the security apparatus and the military. But Assad’s opponents will see the loss of such a high profile figure, if confirmed, as further evidence of a system crumbling from within.

Rebel forces have made advances in recent weeks, seizing several military bases including some outside the capital Damascus.

“He defected. All I can say is that he is out of Syria,” the diplomatic source, who did not want to be named, told Reuters.

Lebanon’s al-Manar Television, citing government sources, said Makdissi was sacked for making statements that did not reflect the government’s position.

Makdissi belongs to Syria’s Christian minority, which has largely stood behind Assad. He worked with the foreign ministry for 10 years and speaks fluent English, a rarity in a state apparatus shaped by the ruling Baath Party’s anti-Western ideology.

He was rarely seen in the media in recent weeks. His mobile telephone was switched off and there was no immediate comment in Syrian state media. The pan-Arab news channel Al Arabiya said Makdissi had left Beirut and was on his way to London, where he was expected to remain.

DAMASCUS BATTLES

The army has been striking back and appears to have focused most of its energy on Damascus, where rebels have been planning to push into the capital from the surrounding suburbs.

The military has been trying to seal off the capital, using heavy bombardment and air raids to try to drive rebels back. Over 56 people were killed ar ound Damascus al one on Sunday, with 200 dead across the country.

The city itself has not been free of unrest. Rebel-held southern districts have been bombarded heavily, activists say. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported fierce clashes around the Tishreen military hospital in the northern Barzeh district and a car bomb in the southern area of Tadamon.

Neither side appears to have the upper hand in the fighting around Damascus. A previous attempt by rebels last July to hold ground in the city was crushed, but the fighters fell back into the suburbs and nearby countryside.

Clashes and tensions also remain high around Damascus International Airport and along the airport highway, which has become an on-and-off battleground that forced foreign airlines to suspend flights to Damascus since Thursday evening.

EgyptAir, which attempted resume flights on Monday after a three-day halt, had to call back a plane headed to Damascus due to the “bad security situation” around the airport, an official from the airline said.

The conflict has grown increasingly bloody in recent months, particularly as rebels began to contest Assad’s power around the capital as well as in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city. More than 40,000 people have died in the conflict, with hundreds more killed each week.

The United Nations said on Monday it was withdrawing “all non-essential international staff” from Syria because of deteriorating security, and was restricting remaining staff to Damascus. It said more armoured vehicles were needed following attacks on humanitarian aid convoys sometimes caught in the crossfire.

CHEMICAL WEAPONS

Rebels have begun to advance more quickly after months of slow sieges to cut off army routes and supplies. In the past few weeks, they seized several military bases, and they are now using anti-aircraft weapons to attack the military helicopters and fighter jets that bombarded their positions with impunity until now.

Media reports citing European and U.S. officials said Syria’s chemical weapons had been moved and could be prepared for use in response - long a fear raised by the opposition.

Syria said on Monday it would not use chemical weapons against its own people after the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Washington would take action against any such escalation.

“Syria has stressed repeatedly that it will not use these types of weapons, if they were available, under any circumstances against its people,” the foreign ministry said. (Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

4 Nov 2012 Bashar al-Assad wants war not peace reveals #Syria’s former prime minister Riyad Hijab

The most senior politician to defect from the Bashar al-Assad’s regime has revealed that the President repeatedly rejected calls by his own government for a political compromise, in favour of all-out war.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (left) and former Prime Minister Riyad Hijab Photo: AFP/Getty Images

By Ruth Sherlock, Amman

7:00PM GMT 04 Nov 2012

In his first full interview with a Western newspaper since he fled to Jordan in August, Riyad Hijab, the former prime minister, told The Daily Telegraph that he and other senior regime figures pleaded with Mr Assad to negotiate with the Syrian opposition.

One week before his defection, Mr Hijab, the vice-president, the parliamentary speaker and the deputy head of the Baath party together held a private meeting with Mr Assad.

“We told Bashar he needed to find a political solution to the crisis,” he said. “We said, ‘These are our people that we are killing.’

“We suggested that we work with Friends of Syria group, but he categorically refused to stop the operations or to negotiate.”

Mr Hijab referred to the war waged against the Muslim Brotherhood by Mr Assad’s father, Hafez, which led to the deaths of up to 10,000 people in an assault on the city of Hama.

“Bashar really thinks that he can settle this militarily,” he said.

“He is trying to replicate his father’s fight in the 1980s.” Mr Hijab was speaking as key anti-regime figures gathered in the Qatari capital Doha to replace the fractured opposition Syrian National Council with a new government-in-exile. Once formed, the new Council would seek to gain formal international recognition, and, crucially, better weapons.

Mr Hijab said he rejected an offer to be part of the US-backed proposal, promising to be a “soldier in this revolution without taking a political position”.

He said the lack of serious action by the West had consolidated President Assad’s confidence.

“Bashar used to be scared of the international community – he was really worried that they would impose a no-fly zone over Syria,” he said. “But then he tested the waters, and pushed and pushed and nothing happened. Now he can run air strikes and drop cluster bombs on his own population.”

Mr Assad’s acceptance of ceasefire proposals by the United Nations envoys Kofi Annan and Lakhdar Brahimi during the 19-month crisis was “just a manoeuvre to buy time for more destruction and killings”, he said.

Indeed in a speech to his cabinet Mr Assad extolled only the dictums of warfare, Mr Hijab said.

It was as he watched his leader speak – coldly, confidently and gripped by the blind conviction that only military force would crush his enemies, he said – that Mr Hijab knew he had no choice but to break away.

“My brief was to lead a national reconciliation government,” Mr Hijab said. “But in our first meeting Bashar made it clear that this was a cover. He called us his ‘War Cabinet’.” The explosion at the Damascus national security building that killed the country’s defence minister and the president’s brother-in-law marked a turning point, Mr Hijab said. After that, no holds were barred.

“The new minister of defence sent out a communiqué telling all heads in the military that they should do ‘whatever is necessary’ to win,” he said. “He gave them a carte blanche for the use of force.” In recent months the formal government had become redundant, Mr Hijab said. Real power was concentrated in the hands of a clique comprising Mr Assad, his security chiefs, relatives and friends.

Certain that he had lost all influence, and watching the tendrils of smoke rising from his home town of Deir al-Zour near the Iraqi-Syrian border after another wave of air strikes, Mr Hijab plotted his escape: “A brother spoke with one of the Free Syrian Army brigades in Damascus,” he said. “We had expected to be at the border in three hours, but it took us three days.”

Since then, the violence has worsened and new fronts have opened across the country. On Sunday a bomb exploded in the centre of Damascus, wounding 11 civilians, state television and activists reported. The blast was detonated close to the Dama Rose hotel, which hosted Mr Brahimi during his recent visit to Damascus.

Rebels also claimed to have seized an oilfield near Deir Al-Zour, while fighting continued around army and airbases west of Aleppo, which the regime have used to strike rebel-held areas in recent weeks.

Mr Hijab said the violence would continue and the regime would stay in power for as long as Russia and Iran continued to provide support. But even if they cut their allegiance, he said Mr Assad would most probably still refuse to quit.

“I am shocked to see Bashar do what he has doing,” he said. “He used to seem like a good human being, but he is worse than his father.

Hafez is a criminal for what he did in Hama, but Bashar is a criminal for what he is doing everywher

11/10/12

Defection of female officer of the #Syrian Army!

I am colonel Zbeyda Al miki of the #Syrian army from the sold “Golan”. I declare my defection from the traitorous Assad army. As I am the first woman officer of the Allawite sect to defect, this is my message:

People of my country, people of my sect, the conflict in Syria is between the oppressor and the oppressed, between the people and the regime, which means that the conflict isn’t between sects and minorities. But the regime is making the conflict sectarian to destroy the revolution.
Brothers in arms, fight for the victory of the people’s revolution, and provide the revolution with a national soul and the feeling of belonging to the nation, not to a sect, with the values of nationalism not sectarianism. Teach the people that the counties geography is not the geography of sects, and that belonging to the nation is to refuse all others attachments that interfere with national unity. Teach and learn that sectarianism is a destructive, a defeat for the country, to pride and freedom, and is a victory for escalation and humiliating regime. You should know that the Syrian revolution is for dignity, pride, equality, and citizenship. That is the national plan, as opposed to that of the criminal, sectarian regime.
Don’t be hitmen for the regime, remember Allah saying: the one who kills one person, is like one who kills all people, and the one who saves a life is like one who saves all lives.
Finally i would like to thank all who helped me to defect from this criminal regime. I would like to thank my brothers in arms in the FSA - ‘Jund Allah’ battalion, with the coordination of the military council of Damascus and its outskirts.

Translation provided by the Syrian Assistance Team!

07/10/12

Former #Syrian Media Aide planning to escape to Russia

A former media aide of President Bashar Al Assad claims the Syrian leader is planning to escape to Russia in the event of his government’s downfall.

Abdullah al-Omar, who worked at the presidential palace until his defection last September, says the Assad regime knows it cannot hold onto power and has already made plans to escape.

Al-Omar also tells Al Jazeera’s Anita McNaught that the July 18th bombing, which killed four senior government officials, was the handiwork of two insiders in the national security office and was originally intended for the president and his brother, Maher.

Interview with defected #Syrian Regime State media director

04/09/12

Translation kindly provided by ‘forthethepeople’ on syrianfreedom.org

Interview with Abdullah Omar, Insider media Relation/Spokes person, who exposed a bombshell, not a bomb that has been part of the regimes bombardment campaign against the Syrian people but a bomb on the regime itself.

Interviewer: Why are you announcing your desertion/dissent now, and do you see it as being late?

Omar: Yes,it does appear as late but I have made this announcement some time ago and in secret. Those that know me in the Media know of my dissent and know of my work for the revolution from inside the palace of basher ELAssad. I was being watched as a Sunni journalist in the palace. I and including other journalists were being watched. After I announced my desertion, and enrollment into the Free Army I set up my family’s safety. I am grateful for those that facilitated my exit and safe passage out of Syria. Many of the Syrian Revolutionaries can confirm my allegiance to the cause.

Interviewer: I would like to commend you on this courageous stance you have taken. And thanks to Allah you are safe and sound. You have promised that you were going to expose a number of secrets and unknowns. You are now in front of many official news outlets, including this one, All of the satellite channels that have been supporting and covering the Syrian Revolution has been watched by this regime and the thugs supporting him including the media relations office within the palace.

Omar: I will be exposing many of the secrets and the “bombs” I referenced at my opening in a stage like approach within the next couple of days. The big one is the serious and gradual preparation of the fleeing/escape of all those Syrians who are responsible within this regime, to Russia. Housing units have been secured within military barracks in Russia for 300 people.

Interviewer: interrupting, wanting to confirm the accuracy and details of what is being said.

Omar: The people who will be leaving are Alawites & responsible personnel from the regime.

Interviewer: asking if any one of these people are influential or important?

Omar: Yes, most are very close to the regime and some are actual butchers for the regime.

Interviewer: can you name a few of them?

Omar: Nafeh Hartoum; Ahmed ELAli; Omran; all three are Colonels. (spelling?). These are close people to Assad and I have heard them speak of this myself. This is all being coordinated by the regime, the military Mukhabarat(intelligence). This will be occurring within the next 60 days with the Assad family leaving at the end.

Interviewer: how did you get this information and the 60 days time line? and the roll out, has this already started?

Omar: Yes, this has started a number of days ago-2 to 3 days ago. I was hearing this all over the palace, during meetings and casual encounters with people within the palace.

Interviewer: Can you give us more concise and relevant information that would relate to every piece of information that you have reported on so far? Some of our viewers will be asking how you got such sensitive information?

Omar: There are nay pieces of information that I have because of me being in the palace, and exposed to all the secrets. I also had information from guests, and dignitaries who attended the palace and not everyone knew when this happened; such as dignitaries and thugs from Hezbollah. There were also Iranian consultants who showed up at the Palace, so I knew when these things happened.

Interviewer: Can you give us more concise and relevant information that would relate to every piece of information that you have reported on so far?

Omar: I will be providing more bomb shells within the next coming days of what has been going on. I need to let you know that Assad and his thugs monitor all the news outlets and are aware of what is happening and will be using every available means such as weapons and ammunition against the Syrian people in all provinces in the coming days. His aim is to use the most arsenal used and to kill the most people he can. He (Omar) went on to say that this is for sure and that we have been witnessing it during the past few days. He warned the people to stay away from military equipment or personnel.. And to be vigilant during the next little while.

Interviewer: Okay, you have mentioned something of significance and that it the warning that there will be 300 people fleeing. We do not have much time today but we will be asking you to come back and speak to this further in a special episode just for you. We would like to have you back in the next few days to give us more details.

Omar: I will be happy to oblige your request and I am pleased to do so as I have been following your broadcasting and the other channels and wanted very much to express my opinion and position during the early stages of the revolution but was not able to do against wishes of my friends and family to do so.

Interviewer: we are all cognizant of the constraints that are placed on media and journalist and we appreciate your position. Will you be able to discuss or shed some light on the Iranian and Hezbollah involvement?

Omar: Yes, there is a significant activity from the Iranian gangs, strong Iranian presence in the Presidential palace, including Revolutionary Guards in the Presidential palace. I met with and photographed with the president of the political office of Hezbollah (met last week).

Interviewer: Do you have certain names in particular from Hezbollah, that some of our viewers might know of?

Omar: Yes, as I have said I met with the president and I have pictures of meeting that I will load on FB. Hussein ELKhalil,not sure it might be Hassan ELKhalil,not I cannot remember the name.

Interviewer: but this person is from the Amel(?) Movement, from the Political Office of Nabil Elberri.

Omar: No, no this person is from Hezbollah, I have his pictures.

Interviewer: maybe there are similar names, nevertheless, what about those Iranian meetings?

Omar: there are regular guests coming into Syria and meeting with the general heads of the secret service; military intelligence, and civil security directors. Regular meeting between the Iranian Rev.Gurads and the palace is a common occurrence. Meetings occurred at the palace or in any of the Syrian districts/provinces.

Interviewer: What about the Russian role in what is happening in Syria?

Omar: They are planning for the fleeing of the Assad family and others in the regime. They also have secured their housing in Moscow. And they have set aside a special building for Assad and his family. This came as a recommendation from those close to Assad and the Makhlouf family.

Interviewer: Do you have any information on Farouk Alsourah? Is he still there or has he deserted?

Omar: he is the deputy to the president and does not have any provisions or jurisdiction. He is in a building that is far from the palace. He is in Damascus and the building is surrounded by security and he does not act without any direction from the president. In Syria the word deputy is just that he is not able to interfere with anything that involves running the country without the authorization from the presidential palace..

Interviewer: can you verify his where abouts, is he in Syria,

Omar: No I am not able to,I do not have any info. Or his where about.

Interviewer: I know that you are busy and have many other engagements but can you tell us briefly how you were able to collaborate with the resistance when you had said that you were watched closely?

Omar: I was using clandestine methods such as using different phones and numbers. Messages were given to certain contacts within the army and Free Syrian Army in a very secretive manner without being detected.

Thank you exchanged, end of interview.

#Syria denies reports of new defection as violence rages

18/08/12

Syrian regime denies that its Vice President Faruq al-Shara has defected as fighting raged in key battlegrounds in several parts of the country

A Syrian man walks by a building destroyed in an airstrike in Aleppo city, Syria (Photo: AP)

Syria denied reports Saturday that top regime official Vice President Faruq al-Shara has defected as fighting raged in key battlegrounds in several parts of the country.

The United Nations meanwhile won support from the West as well as Russia and China for its new envoy for Syria, veteran Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi who was named Friday to replace Kofi Annan.

In Damascus, state television issued a statement from Shara’s office after opposition and media reports that he had fled, saying: “Mr Shara has never thought about leaving the country or going anywhere.”

Shara, 73, is the most powerful Sunni Muslim figure in the minority Alawite-led regime of President Bashar al-Assad and has served in top posts for almost 30 years.

Assad’s regime has already been hard hit by a series of defections since the anti-regime revolt broke out in March 2011, including former prime minister Riad Hijab and high profile general Manaf Tlass — a childhood friend of Assad.

“Initial reports show that there was an attempted defection, but that it failed,” the rebel Free Syrian Army said in a statement referring to Shara.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius had said this week that there could be more “spectacular” defections from the regime, which was also shaken last month by a bomb attack claimed by the FSA which killed four security chiefs.

On the ground, the army launched new air strikes on Aazaz in the northern province of Aleppo, just three days after about 40 people were killed in the rebel-held town, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The army also pounded several areas of Aleppo, the northern city which has become the focus of the conflict since late July, while rebels and troops battled in the southern Salaheddin district of the city.

In Damascus, fighting broke out in the heavily populated southern district of Tadamun, showing that the rebels still have pockets of resistance in the capital despite government forces last month claiming they had retaken it.

The Observatory said a total of 129 people were killed in violence on Friday alone. It reported at least 10 deaths on Saturday.

And in a grim sign of the escalating brutality of the conflict, the Observatory said dozens of bodies had been found dumped in several areas of Damascus province.

Opposition factions had reported that 65 bodies had been found dumped on a rubbish tip in a town near Damascus on Thursday, claiming the victims had been bound, executed and set on fire by pro-government forces.

It is impossible to independently verify such claims as journalists are unable to report freely in Syria.

Government forces appear to be resorting to more attacks from the air against the more poorly armed and disparate rebel groups, while accounts of people being shot dead by snipers are increasing.

The intensified fighting has sent thousands more Syrians fleeing into neighbouring countries, particularly Turkey, as the divided international community appears powerless to act.

But in a sign of a renewed effort to try to end the conflict, the United Nations announced Friday the appointment of Brahimi as new Syria envoy, the day after calling time on its observer mission.

Brahimi himself however admitted he was not confident he would be able to end the 17-month-old conflict, which activists say has killed 23,000 people, while the UN puts the toll at 17,000.

Asked whether he was confident the civil war could be ended, Brahimi told France 24: “No, I’m not. What I am confident of is that I am going to try my utmost, my very, very best.”

UN chief Ban Ki-moon called on the international community to give the new envoy “strong, clear and unified” support, after Annan complained his mission had been hamstrung by the deep rift on the Security Council between the West and traditional Damascus allies Beijing and Moscow.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed Brahimi, saying the world community was committed to bringing about change in Syria and “ensuring that those who commit atrocities will be identified and held accountable”.

China and Russia, which have both vetoed Security Council resolutions on Syria and has accused the West of hampering efforts to end the crisis, vowed to cooperate with Brahimi in the search for a political solution.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called for a ceasefire in Syria, saying that Brahimi’s efforts would be ineffective unless violence ceased.

“Political dialogue will not start, at least these efforts will not lead to a final result, if violence does not cease. And that does not depend on Brahimi,” Russian media quoted Lavrov as saying.

Assad himself has characterised the conflict as a battle against a foreign “terrorist” plot aided by the West and its allies in the region, led by Sunni Muslim powerhouse Saudi Arabia.

18/08/2012 #Syria: Marines Colonel Muhammad Mokhbat defected and joined the FSA - the joint Military command of the Syrian revolution.

07/08/2012 #Syria: Defecting Prime Minister with the Freedom Fighters before fleeing to Jordan

#Syria’s Bashar al-Assad makes rare appearance with visiting Iranian

07/08/2012

BEIRUT — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad made a rare appearance with the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council on Tuesday in video footage broadcast on state television.

Assad has made one appearance since the assassination of four top security officials on July 18. In video footage broadcast the following day, he was shown swearing in a new defense minister.

Saeed Jalili, a top security official in Iran and the country’s lead nuclear negotiator, visited Damascus on Tuesday to discuss the fate of 48 Iranians captured by rebels just outside the capital on Saturday, as well as the ongoing crisis in Syria.

“Kidnapping innocent people is not acceptable anywhere in the world,” Jalili said, according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency. He said Iran would do what it could to “secure release of the 48 innocent pilgrims kidnapped in Syria.”

He also said the only way to resolve the unrest in the country would be to find a “Syrian solution.”

The Iranian government claims that the captives were Shiite pilgrims on their way to Sayida Zeinab, a Muslim shrine south of Damascus that is popular with Shiites. But rebels assert that the Iranians belong to their country’s elite Revolutionary Guard Corps and were on a mission to help the Assad government battle Syria’s persistent 17-month-long uprising.

Jalili’s visit came a day after Syria’s prime minister defected to Jordan, becoming the most senior official to quit Assad’s embattled government, according to rebels who claim they helped him escape.

The reported defection of Prime Minister Riyad al-Hijab buoyed the rebels, who saw it as a clear sign that top officials are abandoning Assad as he attempts

A statement attributed to Hijab and read on the al-Jazeera Arabic news channel Monday said he had resigned to protest his government’s harsh tactics in confronting the opposition.

“I am announcing that I am defecting from this regime, which is a murderous and terrorist regime,” the statement said. “I join the ranks of this dignified revolution.”

Real power in Syria is wielded by Assad’s inner circle of friends, family and the powerful chiefs of his security forces. But the defection of the head of Assad’s government nonetheless sent a strong signal that his support is rapidly unraveling even within the ranks of those assumed to still be loyal.

Hijab, a former agriculture minister and a member of the ruling Baath Party, is a Sunni Muslim from the eastern town of Deir al-Zour, which has been in open revolt against the government for more than a year.

Reuters news service quoted an unidentified Jordanian government official as confirming that Hijab had defected and taken refuge there. Syrian state television, however, reported that Hijab had been fired, less than two months after he was appointed to the job. Deputy Prime Minister Omar Galawanji was appointed as the head of a caretaker government, according to the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA).

Hijab’s departure followed an accelerating stream of defections from Syria’s armed forces, including that of Brig. Gen. Manaf Tlas, a former confidant and close friend of Assad’s who fled to Turkey a month ago, then went to France to join his father, a once-powerful former defense minister.

A senior State Department official traveling with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in South Africa said that the defection, if confirmed, would represent “further evidence that the Assad regime is crumbling.’’

“Its days are numbered, and we call on other senior members of the regime and the military to break with the bloody past and help chart a new path for Syria — one that is peaceful, democratic, inclusive and just,’’ the senior State Department official said.

The Syrian military blasted Damascus and at least half a dozen cities around the country Monday with artillery as fierce clashes rocked the northern city of Aleppo, the country’s largest. At least 116 people were killed across Syria on Monday, including 30 in Aleppo and 29 in Damascus and its suburbs, according to the Local Coordination Committees, an activist network.

In Damascus, a bomb exploded Monday in the state television offices, causing minor injuries, according to SANA. Photos taken after the blast, which hit the third floor of the building, showed a demolished roof with wires hanging down.

The complicated operation to get Hijab out of the country was completed in a series of carefully planned steps by the Free Syrian Army, according to Col. Malik Kurdi, a deputy commander with the rebel force.

“The prime minister and his family were transferred outside Syria to Jordan by separate vehicles and at different times,” Kurdi said. “The defectors cannot leave in an hour or a day. The process takes a long time, and there are many phases and routes.”

Jordanian authorities may not have initially known about Hijab’s entry into the country because he was brought via smuggling routes, Kurdi said. But Jordanian contacts eventually met him once he crossed the border. Kurdi predicted that the successful escape would lead to more defections among other top officials who have been thinking of leaving the country.

Sly reported from Antakya, Turkey. Anne Gearan in South Africa, Greg Miller in Washington, and Suzan Haidamous and Ahmed Ramadan in Beirut contributed to this report.

30/07/12

#Syria: defected pilot LT. Ali Ammar

28/07/12

#Syria, The defection of Colonel Fawwaz Al-Shihabi of northern command at Aleppo and joining the ranks of the Liberal rebels

#Syria defection: Nawaf Fares defects and is ‘in Qatar’

Watch video here.

Syria’s envoy to Baghdad has defected to the opposition and, according to Iraqi officials, is in Qatar.

Nawaf Fares, the first senior Syrian diplomat to abandon President Bashar al-Assad, has urged other politicians and military figures to follow suit.

News of his whereabouts came from Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari. His defection was first reported by Qatar-based TV channel al-Jazeera.

Syria has responded by formally dismissing Mr Fares from his post.

Meanwhile, government forces have shelled an area of Damascus, activists have reported.

Nawaf Fares

Head of Sunni Uqaydat tribe, straddling Syria’s eastern border with Iraq

Served as top Baath Party official in Deir al-Zour province

Appointed Baghdad ambassador 16 Sept 2008

First Syrian envoy to Iraq for nearly three decades

Resigns from Baath Party and as ambassador 11 July 2012

Mortar rounds were said to have been fired into orchards in Kafr Souseh in an apparent offensive against rebels.

One man died and a number of other people were wounded when tanks and armoured vehicles went into a built-up area, reports said.

Independent confirmation is impossible, as journalists’ freedom of movement is heavily restricted.

‘Tribal chief’

Mr Fares’s defection comes just a week after a Syrian general from a powerful family close to President Assad also defected.

He confirmed his decision in a statement broadcast both on TV and on Facebook.

With Syrian revolutionary flags behind him, he read out the statement saying he was resigning both as Syria’s ambassador to Iraq and as a member of the ruling Baath Party.

Analysis

Jim MuirBBC News, Beirut

The defection of Nawaf Fares is an embarrassing blow to the Syrian regime, and a clear sign of the stress the conflict is generating, but it does not necessarily herald a spate of similar desertions.

The government’s discomfort was reflected in an official statement from the foreign ministry in Damascus, lamely announcing that the ambassador had been “relieved of his duties”.

US and Syrian opposition officials seized on Mr Fares’s resignation as a sign that the regime is crumbling.

But the defection of the deputy oil minister earlier this year did not trigger a cascade of similar moves by officials, as he urged.

As with the case of Maj-Gen Munaf Tlas, who fled the country last week, the ambassador may have had specific reasons for turning.

He is a Sunni tribal leader whose area around Deir al-Zor has been heavily battered by government forces recently, as had Gen Tlas’s mainly Sunni hometown Rastan.

The defections are clearly a sign of the times, but given the gravity of what is happening, it is surprising they have been so few and far between.

“I call on all party members to do the same because the regime has transformed it into a tool to oppress the people and their aspirations to freedom and dignity.

“I announce, from this moment on, that I am siding with the people’s revolution in Syria, my natural place in these difficult circumstances which Syria is going through.”

Syria’s foreign ministry said he had made statements that contradicted the duties of his post and no longer had any relation to the Syrian embassy in Baghdad.

The BBC’s Jim Muir in neighbouring Lebanon says this is a highly damaging defection for President Assad.

Mr Fares, significantly, is also chief of a Sunni tribe straddling Syria’s eastern border with Iraq, our correspondent adds.

That area, around the city of Deir al-Zour, has become a hotbed of support for the rebels and has been heavily bombarded in recent weeks.

Syria has been convulsed by internal conflict since protests against President Assad began early last year. The protests turned into an armed rebellion and thousands of people have been killed.

Last week, senior army officer Brig Gen Manaf Tlas fled Syria via Turkey.

He was a commander of a unit of the elite Republican Guard and as a young man he attended military training with President Assad.

Gen Tlas had been under a form of home arrest since May 2011 because he opposed security measures imposed by the regime, sources said.

‘Clear consequences’

In a separate development, Western nations are pressing the UN to threaten Damascus with sanctions as it considers renewing the mandate for its observer mission in Syria which expires on 20 July.

They want a 10-day ultimatum to be part of a Security Council resolution on the future of the UN’s observer mission in the country. A new resolution must be passed before the mission’s mandate ends on Friday next week.

The mission had a 90-day remit to monitor a truce, but fighting has continued largely unabated.

The truce formed part of a six-point peace plan brokered by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who has called for “clear consequences” for the Syrian government and rebels if the ceasefire is not observed.

Chapter 7 of UN Charter

Action in response to threats to peace, breaches of peace and acts of aggression

Article 41 enables Security Council to decide measures not involving armed force

Can suspend economic and diplomatic relations as well as rail, sea and other communications

If Article 41 measures are inadequate, Article 42 enables Security Council to take action by air, sea or land forces for international peace and security

Source: UN

Russia has suggested a 90-day extension. But Western states say a simple rollover of the mission is not enough.

A draft resolution has been circulated threatening Damascus with sanctions within 10 days, if it fails to stop using heavy weapons and pull back its troops from towns and cities.

The UK’s envoy to the UN, Mark Lyall Grant, told reporters that Britain, France, the US and Germany would propose making compliance with the ceasefire mandatory under Chapter 7 of the UN charter.

Last week, more than 100 countries called on the Security Council to invoke Article 41 of Chapter 7, which stops short of military intervention.

Russia has said use of Chapter 7 is a “last resort”. China, which like Russia has vetoed the two previous attempts to impose tougher measures, has said it will support a rollover of the mission.

He is right and its heartbreaking: Manaf Tlas: Syrian regime ‘taking country to Hell’ bbc.co.uk/news/world-mid…
— abuhatem (@abuhatem) July 7, 2012

Syrian army is ‘destroyed physically and mentally’, says defected Syrian General #Syria

25 Jun 2012

Earlier this month, Syrian Brigadier General Ahmad Berro, head of a tank unit in Aleppo province, fled to Turkey with his family.

The Brigadier General said that he estimated that the Syrian army had lost control of about 60 per cent of the country. He added the Free Syria Army was growing in strength.

“The Syrian army, the Syrian army is tired after a year and four months. They know that they are killing their sons, and no human can kill his son.

“The army is already destroyed physically and mentally. The army is not controlling the Syrian lands completely and from what I see, 60 per cent is out of the regime’s control,” he said.

An attorney general who also defected from Syria said he left because the government was killing civilians.

“I cannot handle any more, I could not handle the regime’s crimes, it is killing children, women, old men. The regime is killing children, women, old men in the roads. It is killing them from a close distance. It is using field execution, the people are not killed in exchanges of fire as the regime is claiming.”

The interviews come as it was reported that another Syrian general, two colonels, two majors, a lieutenant and their families - altogether 199 people - had crossed the border into Turkey overnight.

Thirteen Syrian generals are reportedly now in Turkey which is giving logistical support to the Free Syrian Army.

Amateur footage purportedly from Homs appears to show the city being bombarded and the hospitals full with casualties from the fighting.

The footage cannot be independently verified because of foreign reporting restrictions in the country.

Defectors Recount Tales of Conflict; ‘Blood on My Hands’ #Syria

By MARIA ABI-HABIB

RAMTHA, JORDAN—Sitting among family in this Jordanian town on the Syrian border, an ex-army intelligence officer recounted how he worked against rebel forces by intimidating family members to prevent military defections.

Now he’s a defector.

Former Syrian Army military officers who defected trained new volunteers this month in Aleppo, Syria. Other defectors have left the country.

At the start of the Syrian revolution a year ago, the 21-year-old said he sat in his barracks with colleagues and watched TV reports of widespread protests against the government that met with increasingly brutal crackdowns. One day, he said, the TVs were removed and his commanders told him and his colleagues they were fighting against terrorists aligned with the U.S. and Israel who were plotting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.

The intelligence officer said he worked tirelessly to crush the uprising in western Homs for five months, finally being granted two days of leave in July. He returned to his home in southern Deraa but it was riddled with bullets. His brother had been arrested under the charge of “protesting” and his cousin killed by bullets fired by Syrian troops while demonstrating, he and his family members said in interviews.

The officer then realized he hadn’t been fighting terrorists, but his own people, he said.

“I have innocent blood on my hands,” he said, staring at the floor as his 3-year-old sister played beside him and his father and brother smoked cigarettes.

The intelligence officer was interviewed here in Ramtha, a poor city of whitewashed apartment buildings, and home to many of the 95,000 Syrian refugees that Jordan says have left Syria since the uprising began. Other defectors remain in Syria.

Many diplomats say the prospects are bleak for the opposition to topple Mr. Assad—who activists say continues his bloody crackdown even after a cease-fire began on Thursday—until more Syrian troops switch sides.

Analysts peg the number of defections at around 10,000 military members, out of about 304,000 active-duty troops.

This month several Gulf nations pledged to fund a pool of up to $40 million to pay defectors’ salaries and encourage them to turn their guns on the regime. But refugees say the fund—which hasn’t yet begun funding defectors—will have little chance of encouraging mass defections unless the international community can help secure the families of defected soldiers, police and security forces.

There are other reasons mass defections aren’t happening as fast as the opposition had hoped. These include the loyalty Mr. Assad enjoys from fellow Alawites, a minority Muslim sect in Syria, in the top levels of the government and military. Most of the defections come from the lower ranks, who are predominantly Sunni, members of Syria’s majority population.

Also, the military is structured in a way that limits communication among different units, heightening the challenge of coordinating against Mr. Assad, said Ayham Kamel, an analyst at the Eurasia Group.

“The funds from the Gulf represent a catalyst for broader defections, but they are unlikely to produce results overnight or even in a short period of time,” Mr. Kamel said. “And the bulk of ammunition and heavy weapons are held by units most loyal to the regime.”

Still, some soldiers have remained in service as undeclared rebels within the system, diplomats and several Syrian refugees interviewed in Jordan say. At great risk, these soldiers inform the opposition of the military’s movements and wave rebels through checkpoints.

Here in Ramtha, a former lieutenant colonel recounted his swift—and short-lived—decision to desert the Syrian police and join rebel forces.

“I fought until they locked up my father, interrogated my sisters and burned down my house,” said the former officer, while sitting on floor cushions with other refugees. “Now that I’m no longer fighting and left Syria, the pressure on my family is less.”

He declined to provide contact details for his family inside Syria out of concerns for their security, and his story, like those of some other refugees, couldn’t otherwise be corroborated.

Elsewhere in Ramtha, a former soldier who escaped to Irbid, Jordan, near the Syrian border, said his brother defected from the Syrian air force in April only to be caught and arrested. When their father went to the prison to inquire about the brother, he too was locked up, the soldier said.

The rest of the family is too scared to ask after the father and son, worried they too will be jailed, the former soldier said.

“No country is providing us weapons, Saudi and Qatar say they want to, but don’t,” said the former solider, 29 years old. “If the West doesn’t help us or other Arab countries, we’ll go to Al Qaeda. We don’t want to accept them, but what can we do when our children are being killed?”

The intelligence officer said he followed his father here in December after being stationed in western Homs province.

Worried, the intelligence officer would call his family in Deraa—a southern province where antiregime protests started early last year—asking if they were keeping safe from terrorist attacks. Concerned the phones were tapped, the intelligence officer’s family would respond vaguely and hurriedly hang up. “All I could think about was that I had to leave the army,” he said. “But I had to secure my family first.”

Meanwhile, the army intelligence officer’s Deraa experience embittered him to the Assad regime, and when he returned to Homs in July, he said he became an informant, telling rebels about military operations.

In December, he told his superiors that a family member was ill, and returned to Deraa. He then fled to Ramtha after securing his family, who now lives in a cramped three-room apartment there with his sister’s husband and small child.

He said that what especially haunts him is the intelligence he provided to colleagues to arrest defectors’ female family members, a way to pressure the former soldiers to turn themselves in. He said he heard reports of rape perpetrated by his colleagues as another form of intimidation against family members, but hadn’t seen any firsthand.

“I defected because of what I saw how they killed people, like my own cousin, and destroyed their houses,” he said. “I decided I couldn’t do this.”

Write to Maria Abi-Habib at maria.habib@dowjones.com