By Albert Aji, Beirut

Thursday, March 08, 2012

The UN humanitarian chief entered the shattered Syrian district of Baba Amr, where activists accuse regime forces of trying to cover up evidence of execution-style killings and reprisal attacks following a bloody military siege.

Valerie Amos was expected to give the first outside assessment of the conditions in the neighbourhood in the central city of Homs.

The government had sealed off Baba Amr since regime forces recaptured the neighbourhood from rebels last Thursday following a deadly assault that lasted nearly four weeks. Activists accuse the government of using the past six days to try to cover up evidence of atrocities by the regime.

Khaled Erq Sousi, head of the emergency committee of the Syrian Red Crescent, said that Amos was allowed into Baba Amr. The government had rebuffed an earlier request by Amos to visit the country this month as regime troops attacked Baba Amr, finally wresting it back from rebels who had held it for months.

Amos has said the aim of her visit is “to urge all sides to allow unhindered access for humanitarian relief workers so they can evacuate the wounded and deliver essential supplies.”

Despite international appeals, the Syrian government still has not allowed any aid workers into Baba Amr, saying there was a security risk. But activists say the government has been engaged in a “mopping-up” operation to hide their activities.

After seizing Baba Amr from the rebels, regime forces appeared to be turning their attention to other rebellious areas, including the northern province of Idlib near Turkey. The shift suggested that the Syrian military is unable to launch large operations simultaneously, even though the security services remain largely strong and loyal.

According to witnesses, Syrian troops shelled the northern villages in Idlib yesterday.

Syrian President Bashar al Assad defies mounting international pressure to end the year-old crackdown on an uprising against him.

According to state news agency Sana, Assad said he will continue to confront “foreign-backed terrorism.” Since the uprising began last March, he has blamed armed gangs and foreign terrorists for the unrest, not protesters seeking change.

The UN says more than 7,500 people have been killed since Syria’s uprising began. Activists put the death toll at more than 8,000.

Despite the growing bloodshed, president Barack Obama has said unilateral US military action against Assad’s regime would be a mistake.

In Washington, Defence Secretary Leon Panetta pushed back against fresh demands for US military involvement in Syria to end Assad’s deadly crackdown on his people.

The panel’s top Republican, Sen John McCain of Arizona, said the estimated 7,500 dead and the bloodshed calls for US leadership that a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, displayed during the Bosnian war in the 1990s and that Obama eventually showed on Libya last year.

The Associated Press

BEIRUT - A French photojournalist and a prominent American war correspondent working for a British newspaper were killed Wednesday by Syrian shelling of the opposition stronghold Homs as President Bashar Assad’s regime escalated its attacks on rebel bases by strafing from helicopter gunships, activists said.

Weeks of withering barrages on the central city of Homs have failed to drive out opposition factions that include rebel soldiers who fled Assad’s forces. Hundreds have died in the siege and the latest deaths further galvanized international pressure on Assad, who appears intent on widening his military crackdowns despite the risk of pushing Syria toward full-scale civil war.

“This tragic incident is another example of the shameless brutality of the Assad regime.” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said of the journalists killed.

“That’s enough now, the regime must go,” said French President Nicolas Sarkozy after his government confirmed the two deaths.

French spokeswoman Valerie Pecresse identified those killed as French photojournalist Remi Ochlik and American reporter Marie Colvin, who was working for Britain’s Sunday Times.

France’s Foreign Minister, Alain Juppe, said the attacks show the “increasingly intolerable repression” by Syrian forces. French Communication Minister Frederic Mitterrand said of the journalists killed: “It’s abominable.”

Syrian activists said at least two other Western journalists - French reporter Edith Bouvier of Le Figaro and British photographer Paul Conroy of the Sunday Times - were wounded in Wednesday’s shelling, which claimed at least 13 lives.

The Syrian military has intensified its attacks on Homs in the past few days, aiming to retake rebel-held neighborhoods that have become powerful symbols of resistance to Assad’s rule. For the government in Damascus, Homs is a critical battleground to maintain its control of Syria’s third-largest city and keep more rebel pockets from growing elsewhere.

In the northwestern restive province of Idlib, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights claimed that Syrian army helicopters fitted with machine guns opened fire on the village of Ifis. Idlib is a main base of the rebel Free Syrian Army.

Another opposition group, the Local Coordination Committees, said troops conducted raids in the Damascus district of Mazzeh district and the suburb Jobar, where dozens of people were detained. In Jobar, the group said troops broke doors of homes and shops and set up checkpoints.

The group also said Syrian troops backed by tanks stormed the southern village of Hirak and launched a wave of arrests.

The Obama administration opened the door slightly Tuesday to international military assistance for Syria’s rebels, with officials saying new tactics may have to be explored if Assad continues to defy pressure to halt a brutal crackdown on dissenters that has raged for 11 months and killed thousands.

The White House and State Department said they still hope for a political solution. But faced with the daily onslaught by the Assad regime against Syrian civilians, officials dropped the administration’s previous strident opposition to arming anti-regime forces. It remained unclear, though, what, if any, role the U.S. might play in providing such aid.

A Homs-based activist, Omar Shaker, said the journalists were killed when several rockets hit a garden of a house used by activists and journalists in the besieged Homs neighborhood of Baba Amr, which has come under weeks of heavy bombardment by forces from Assad’s regime. At least 13 people were killed in Wednesday’s shelling, including the journalists, activists said.

The U.N. estimates that 5,400 people have been killed in repression by the regime of President Bashar Assad against a popular uprising that began 11 months ago. Syrian activists, however, put the death toll at more than 7,300.

He added that intense Syrian troops shelling with tanks and artilleries began at 6:30 a.m. and was continuing hours later. He said the apartment used by journalists was hit around 10 a.m.

An amateur video posted online by activist showed what they claimed were bodies of two people in the middle of a heavily damaged house. It said they were of the journalists. One of the dead was wearing what appeared to be a flak jacket.

Many foreign journalists have been sneaking into Syria illegally in the past months with the help of smugglers from Lebanon and Turkey. Although the Syrian government has allowed some journalists into the country their movement is tightly controlled by Information Ministry minders.

Colvin, from Oyster Bay, New York, was in her 50s and a veteran foreign correspondent for Britain’s Sunday Times for the past two decades. She was instantly recognizable for an eye patch worn after being injured covering conflicts in Sri Lanka in 2001.

Colvin said she would not “hang up my flak jacket” even after the eye injury.

“So, was I stupid? Stupid I would feel writing a column about the dinner party I went to last night,” she wrote in the Sunday Times after the attack. “Equally, I’d rather be in that middle ground between a desk job and getting shot, no offense to desk jobs.

In Geneva, the International Red Cross said it was holding talks with members of the opposition Syrian National Council. The ICRC called Tuesday for a daily two-hour halt to fighting in Syria so it can bring emergency aid to affected areas and evacuate the wounded and sick.

Head of ICRI operations for the Middle East, Beatrice Megevand-Roggo, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the ICRC had almost no contacts with opposition figures inside Syria.

The journalists’ deaths came a day after a Syrian sniper shot dead Rami al-Sayyed, a prominent activist in Baba Amr who was famous for posting online videos, Shaker and the Local Coordination Committees activist group said.

On Jan. 11, award-winning French TV reporter Gilles Jacquier was killed in Homs. The 43-year-old correspondent for France-2 Television was the first Western journalist to die since the uprising began in March. Syrian authorities have said he was killed in a grenade attack carried out by opposition forces - a claim questioned by the French government, human rights groups and the Syrian opposition.

Last week, New York Times correspondent Anthony Shadid died of an apparent asthma attack in Syria after he sneaked in to cover the conflict.

Questions on Assad’s wife swirl amid #Syria violence - The mysterious Mrs. Assad

As the death toll in Syria rises and international pressure on the country’s embattled ruler is ratcheted up, his elegant British-born wife has become a polarizing figure.

BEIRUT — Syrian troops stormed a flashpoint suburb of Damascus on Thursday, raiding homes and searching vehicles, while tens of thousands of backers of President Bashar Assad poured into the streets of several cities in a show of support for his embattled regime.

Just days after pulling out of the suburb of Douma following intense clashes with anti-regime fighters, government troops pushed back in early Thursday from all directions, meeting no resistance, activists said.

“They are entering homes, searching cars and stopping people in the streets to check identity cards,” activist and Douma resident Mohammed al-Saeed told The Associated Press, saying the soldiers had lists of wanted people. “There is very little movement in the streets and nobody is allowed to leave or enter Douma.”

The suburb has become a flashpoint in recent months, with large protests against Assad that security forces crushed by force.

Just 10 miles (16 kilometers) away in downtown Damascus, thousands of people waved Syrian flags and shouted support for President Bashar Assad. Similar rallies were held in Aleppo in the north, according to state-run media.

The Syrian revolt began 10 months ago with largely peaceful anti-government protests, but it has grown increasingly militarized in recent months as frustrated regime opponents and army defectors arm themselves and fight back against government forces.

The government crackdown has killed more than 5,400 people since March, according to estimates from the United Nations.

Assad’s regime claims terrorists acting out a foreign conspiracy are behind the uprising, not protesters seeking change, and that thousands of security forces have been killed.

After 10 months of violent conflict, the unrest has reached something of a stalemate with many Syrians calling for change but also fearing a descent into civil war as the country’s various sectarian and religious groups turn on each other.

International pressure on Syria to end the bloodshed so far has produced few results.

The Arab League has sent observers to the country as part of a plan to the end the crisis, but the mission has been widely criticized for failing to stop the bloodshed. Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia pulled out of the mission Tuesday, asking the U.N. Security Council to intervene because the Syrian government has failed to stop the bloodshed.

Decisive action from the U.N. appears unlikely, however, as Russia, a strong Syrian ally, has opposed moves like sanctions.

Violence, meanwhile, has continued unabated.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a joint army and police force was ambushed Thursday near the town of Khirbet Ghazaleh, killing four members of the security forces and wounding five more.

The Arab League has also called for the establishment of a national unity government within two months, including regime and opposition members and led by a consensus leader.

The unity government would prepare for free parliamentary and presidential elections to be held under Arab and international supervision, according to the League plan.

Under the proposal, Assad would give his vice president full powers to cooperate with the proposed government to enable it to carry out its duties during a transitional period.

Syria has rejected the plan, saying it violates its sovereignty.

A letter seen by Reuters and signed by 14 ambassadors, including those of the United States, France, Britain, Germany, Qatar and Kuwait, asks for Syria’s situation to be discussed at the 58-member UNESCO executive board meeting on February 27.

“UNESCO must respond to these appeals for concerted action to address the egregious human rights situation in Syria,” an explanatory memo attached to the letter said.
“The situation in Syria challenges UNESCO’s basic constitutional objectives, in particular to further respect for justice, for the law and for human rights and fundamental freedoms,” said the letter, which was drafted in December.

More than 5,000 people have been killed since a revolt erupted in March against President Bashar al-Assad’s government, according to the United Nations. Damascus says “terrorists” have killed more than 2,000 soldiers and police.

“We have received the letter,” said a Paris-based Arab diplomat. “These are ideas circulating ahead of the executive board meeting and the question is what is the legal basis?”

Exploratory meetings were taking place this week and early next week to decide the matter.

The Arab diplomat said it was possible the committee could condemn Syria, which would probably be backed by Arab League states. But it was unclear whether Damascus could be expelled from the body as that decision generally can only be made by the U.N. General Assembly, which happens once every two years.

“I am not aware that UNESCO has ever before expelled a member state from one of its committees, or passed a resolution condemning Syria, so both actions would be unprecedented,” Geneva-based NGO UN Watch said in a statement.

Officials at UNESCO could not be reached for comment.

The letter was signed by major Western powers plus Denmark, Spain, Chile, Slovakia, Qatar and Kuwait and diplomats said support from more countries was likely.

A U.N. commission of inquiry in November said Syrian military and security forces had committed crimes against humanity including murder, torture and rape, putting the blame on Assad’s government.

An Arab League monitoring team in Syria has been diminished by the pullout of Gulf Arabs in frustration at persisting violence and the 22-member body has called for U.N. support in getting Assad to hand over power to a unity government.

(Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Syrian president predicts ‘triumph’ #Syria

Damascus, Syria (CNN) — As violence erupted in Homs, Syria’s president turned up at a boisterous pro-government rally in Damascus Wednesday, whipping up his followers and again underscoring his view that the months of popular unrest in his nation are the result of a “conspiracy.”

“We will triumph over this conspiracy,” Bashar al-Assad told a cheering, clapping and flag-waving throng.

“I will not say that the country is confronting a major conspiracy because you are here to stand up against it,” he said. “These are the final phases of the conspiracy, and we will make sure that we will stand up victorious.”

Al-Assad’s appearance at the rally comes a day after he delivered a defiant televised speech, strongly defending his government’s reforms and blaming the unrest on “external conspiracies.”

Meanwhile, the Local Coordination Committees in Syria, an opposition activist group, said in a statement that 25 people were killed in unrest Wednesday — seven in Hama, 12 in Homs, two each in Idlib and Haleb and one each in Latakia and Deir Ezzor.

The government blamed an “armed terrorist group” for a mortar attack it said killed an award-winning French journalist and eight Syrians in the strife-torn city of Homs.

Gilles Jacquier of the France 2 TV network died when a mortar shell struck the pro-government rally he was attending as part of a government-authorized tour of Homs, the network said. He is the first Western journalist to die in the 10-month-old uprising in Syria.

Wednesday’s rally in Damascus occurred during an Arab League fact-finding mission to see if the Syrian government is adhering to an agreement to end the violence.

Al-Assad made the appearance amid widespread grass-roots and international anger over his government’s crackdown against peaceful protesters. The crackdown has continued despite the presence of Arab League observers and international pressure, with opposition activists estimating the number of deat at 6,000-plus.

Four members of the Syrian army were killed when a bomb exploded in a military bus Wednesday, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency said. Eight others were injured in the explosion in the Damascus countryside, according to SANA. It blamed the attack on an “armed terrorist group.”

Opposition groups blame the violence on al-Assad’s government, but the president continues to blame the bloodshed on terrorists.

Al-Assad — who rarely makes public appearances — caused quite a stir when he showed up at Wednesday’s rally. A news anchor said his presence “caught us off guard, quite surprising.”

Standing next to Syria’s first lady, Asma al-Assad, the president lauded his supporters.

“I came here so we can put our hands together, to build the great Syria that we love, that we believe in. Together, we will work together and walk forward with the reforms,” al-Assad said.

He said he wanted to “shake hands” with everyone in the crowd and in every city in Syria. He made reference to the fact that he has been criticized for not talking directly to the people.

“I wanted to be with you so I can have the power from you, because of you, in confronting these obstacles ahead of us. I salute you as you come here for support, coming from your mosques, your churches, to support your great nation, your military, your institutions,” he said.

The Arab League has called on Damascus to stop violence against civilians, free political detainees, remove tanks and weapons from cities and allow outsiders, including the international news media, to travel freely around Syria.

Arab League officials have pledged to add to their 165 observers already in the country. But the group’s mission has been met with skepticism from both al-Assad supporters and anti-government activists.

Anwar Malek, an Algerian Arab League observer who withdrew from the monitoring team, told Al-Jazeera he quit because he found himself “serving the regime, and not part of an independent monitoring body. “

He said the mission is providing the “regime cover for more killing.” Malek said he spent 15 days in the restive city of Homs and saw “shameful scenes,” finding people in detention facilities in a “deplorable and tragic state.”

20 December 2011 BEIRUT - Syria has agreed to an Arab League plan to send foreign monitors, bowing to growing international pressure to end its bloody crackdown on a nine-month uprising. However the opposition saw the deal as a stalling tactic, especially given reports by activists that more than 100 people were killed on the same day.

Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby said Monday in Cairo that an initial mission headed by one of his assistants will go to Syria within a day or two to discuss plans for 500 observers to eventually deploy around the country. He said they will be in small groups of at least 10 and each team will go to a different location.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Al Moallem rejected accusations the regime was trying to stall, even though it delayed the monitoring agreement for weeks.

‘The signing of the protocol is the beginning of cooperation between us and the Arab League, and we will welcome the Arab League observers,’ he told reporters in Damascus.

He said the observers will have a one-month mandate that can be extended by another month if both sides agree. The observers will be ‘free’ in their movements and ‘under the protection of the Syrian government,’ he said. But they will not be allowed to visit sensitive military sites.

The Arab League plan calls for removing Syrian forces and heavy weapons from city streets, starting talks with opposition leaders and allowing human rights workers and journalists into the country, along with observers from member countries.

President Bashar Assad’s regime accepted the monitors after Arab leaders warned they would turn to the UN Security Council to try to end the crackdown that the UN says has killed at least 5,000 people since March.

Pressure from Syria’s longtime ally Russia clearly played a role in the decision to allow observers.

Al-Moallem suggested that Damascus had agreed to sign on the advice of Russia, a veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council. Two months ago, Russia and China vetoed a Western-backed Security Council resolution condemning the bloodshed in Syria. But Moscow said last week it would work on a draft resolution at the UN that criticises Syria for using disproportionate force against protesters.

The UN General Assembly on Monday condemned human rights violations by Assad’s government, calling for an immediate end to violence and implementation of the Arab League plan ‘without further delay.’

Violence has escalated in recent weeks in Syria with more frequent armed clashes between military defectors and security forces. The increasing militarization of the conflict has raised fears the country is sliding toward civil war.

Activists said security forces killed up to 70 army defectors Monday as they were deserting their military posts near the Turkish border. At least 30 other people died in other violence across the country, the activists said. If accurate, it would be one of the heaviest daily tolls of the entire revolt.

Security forces shot and killed at least 20 people in the southern province of Daraa, in central Syria’s Homs region and in the country’s north. One person was killed when security forces opened fire on thousands of mourners in Damascus’ central neighborhood of Midan. The mourners were attending the funeral of a child who was gunned down by security forces a day earlier.

Syria has placed severe restrictions on journalists, and the reports by the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Syrian Revolution General Commission activist group could not be independently confirmed.

By signing onto the Arab League plan, the Syrian regime stands to gain more time and to avert — for now at least — the possibility of wider international involvement in the crisis. But critics are skeptical that the regime will allow full, unrestricted access to trouble spots and said it was likely just a delaying tactic.

Burhan Ghalioun, the leader of Syria’s main opposition group, the Syrian National Council, accused the Assad regime of lying and said the signing was ‘worthless’ in light of the brutal crackdown daily.

‘The Syrian regime is maneuvering and wants to buy time,’ he said in Tunisia, where the group has been holding a three-day conference aimed at unifying Syria’s fragmented opposition.

Ghalioun called for Arab military intervention to protect civilians and the creation of humanitarian corridors to deliver aid.

A Syrian-based anti-regime activist who identifies himself as Abu Hamza said the Syrian regime ‘has signed something it cannot implement.’ He said if the government withdraws the military from the streets, mass demonstrations will take pace throughout the country.

‘This will automatically lead to the downfall of the regime,’ Abu Hamza said, declining to give his real name for fear of retribution.

The regime claims armed gangs and terrorists are behind the uprising, not protesters seeking more freedoms in one of the most totalitarian regimes in the Middle East.

WASHINGTON: The United States and France on Tuesday sent their ambassadors back to Syria to champion protesters, demanding that the regime protect the envoys who had been pulled out due to safety fears.

US Ambassador Robert Ford and French Ambassador Eric Chevallier had faced harassment and threats as they shone a light on President Bashar al-Assad’s nine-month crackdown, in which more than 4,000 people are said to have died.

“We believe his presence in the country is among the most effective ways to send the message that the United States stands with the people of Syria,” US State Department spokesman Mark Toner said as the two envoys flew back in.

Ford will seek to provide “reliable reporting on the situation on the ground” and engage “with the full spectrum of Syrian society on how to end the bloodshed and achieve a peaceful political transition,” Toner said.

White House spokesman Jay Carney demanded that Syria uphold international obligations to protect foreign diplomats and allow US officers “to conduct their work free of intimidation or obstacles.”

In Paris, deputy foreign ministry spokesman Romain Nadal said that the concerns that led to Chevallier’s recall have not gone away but that “his work on the ground in Syria is important.”

“France is more than ever at the side of the Syrian people,” Nadal told AFP.

The US and French ambassadors had both travelled in Syria to document protests and show their support, amid official attempts to prevent international media and observers from witnessing the bloodshed first-hand.

The United States announced on October 24 that Ford had been brought back to Washington because of “credible threats.” Assad supporters had pelted Ford and the embassy staff with tomatoes and damaged US vehicles as they visited an opposition leader in Damascus.

The French ambassador was recalled on November 16 after mobs loyal to Assad attacked France’s honorary consulate in the northern city of Latakia and the detached chancery in Aleppo.

Toner said the United States “felt there was a sense of urgency” in sending Ford back to Damascus but said that diplomats would “keep a close eye” on what Washington viewed as threats to him, including articles in the state-run press.

In further pressure on Syria, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday held talks in Geneva with seven opponents of Assad. She called for the protection of women and minorities, a key concern for a future without Assad, as he comes from the minority Alawite sect.

“A democratic transition includes more than removing the Assad regime,” Clinton said in talks with the seven members of the dissident Syrian National Council, which was formed in October.

“It means setting Syria on the path of the rule of law and protecting the universal rights of all citizens regardless of sect, or ethnicity or gender,” she said.

“The Syrian opposition as represented here recognizes that Syria’s minorities have legitimate questions and concerns about their future,” the chief US diplomat said.

The opposition understands “that they need to be assured that Syria will be better off under a regime of tolerance and freedom that provides opportunity and respect and dignity on the basis of the consent rather than on the whims of a dictator,” she added.

Syria has come under intense international pressure as Assad tries to crush the worst threat to his family’s four-decade rule over the country, with the United States, European Union, Arab League and Turkey all imposing sanctions.

The Arab League has threatened to slap new sanctions on Damascus unless it lets in monitors. In a letter late Sunday, Assad’s regime said it will allow monitors but only if conditions are met.

Syria accuses “armed terrorist groups” of fuelling the unrest, which comes amid a wave of street protests across the Arab world this year that have toppled authoritarian regimes in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia.

President Barack Obama appointed Ford, a veteran diplomat in the Arab world, as the first US ambassador to Syria in five years as part of his administration’s effort to engage US adversaries.

Obama’s Republican opponents strongly criticized the move, saying it sent the wrong signal to Assad, but have lent support to Ford as his mission turns dangerous.

-AFP/ac

CLICK HERE TO SIGN!!

Dear Mr. Ban Ki-moon: We the undersigned below, people of Syria from our various secular, religious and ethnic backgrounds would like to thank you for all your effort leading the United Nations to fulfill its vision and achieve its mission, and also to further emphasize to your office that the acuity and the mounting nature of the human rights violations in Syria today are probably among the most pressing ones globally. In Syria today Daily human rights violations have led to date to the loss of thousands of lives and are placing thousands more in an imminent danger. The aggression and the fundamental human rights violations in Syria have recently transitioned into a devastating war launched by the Syrian government against its own people resulting in torture, disappearance, arbitrary detention and ultimately violating the dignity and existence of human life for children and adults alike. We respectfully ask you to: 1- continue to generate international pressure to force the Syrian government to stop its aggression. Allow peace monitors and international press to enter the country. 2- As the OHCHR routinely work with other organizations, governments and institutions to achieve its objectives we respectfully ask that the OHCHR accept the Syrian National Counsel as a legitimate partner to achieve its objectives in Syria. 3- Through its traditional mechanisms and resources to stop wars, maintain peace and preserve human lives we kindly ask your office to devote its highest attention to facilitate world interventions that will preserve human life and protect civilians in Syria, including the creation of safe haven zones along the Syrian borders to provide a refuge to the innocent population. We are all confident that the urgency of the Syrian matter, stopping the aggression of the Syrian government and protecting civilians will always be of a paramount importance to your office. ————————————————————————————————————————————————— Arabic Version of the above letter: الرئيس العام لمنظمة الامم المتحدة: نحن الموقعون أدناه مواطنون سوريون من مختلف مكونات الشعب السوري الدينية والعرقية . نود بداية ان نتقدم بجزيل الشكر على قيادتكم منظمة الامم المتحدة لتحقيق الأهداف المتوخاة من تأسيسها . وبعد نود ان نشدد لسيادتكم على ان التفاقم السريع والحاد لتجاوزات حقوق الانسان والاعتداء عليها في سورية قد بلغ مرحلة قد تكون من اشدها خطورة على المستوى العالمي اليوم. ان الاعتداءات على حقوق الانسان في سوريا اليوم قد اودت بحياة الآلاف من الأرواح وتعرض حياة الاف آخرين الى خطر محدق وقد تقدمت هذه الاعتداءت في المرحلة الاخيرة الى مرحلة اكثر خطورة ترقى الى درجة حرب تشنها الحكومة السورية على شعبها لاجئة بذلك الى شتى وسائل التعذيب والاختطاف والاعتقال العشوائي ومتوجة ذلك بالاعتداء على حرمة وقدسية الحياة البشرية للأطفال والشيوخ رجالا ونساء على حد سواء . وعليه وباجل الاحترام نساءل سيادتكم مايلي: ١- الاستمرار في تنمية الضغط الدولي هادفين بذلك على إجبار الحكومة السورية على وقف اعتداءاتها والسماح لمراقبين سلام دوليين وللصحافة الدولية من دخول سوريا للتحقق من مجريات هذه الاعتداءات . ٢- كما انه من المتداول ان يتعاون مكتب حقوق الانسان التابع لمنظمة الامم المتحدة (OHCHR) مع حكومات ومنظمات ومؤسسات مستقلة بغية تحقيق الاهداف المرجوة فإننا نلتمس من مكتبكم التعامل مع المجلس الوطني السوري كشريك شرعي يساهم في تحقيق هذه الاهداف. ٣- نلتمس من هيئة الامم المتحدة و مستخدمة كل الوسائل والآليات المتاحة اليها ان تولي اجل اهتمامها لمساندة اي اجراءات دولية تهدف الى حماية المدنيين السوريين والحفاظ على حياتهم وتمكينهم من تحقيق أهدافهم المشروعة،، بما في ذلك دعم تامين مناطق آمنة على الحدود السورية يلجا اليها الأبرياء من الشعب . وكلنا ثقة بان الطبيعة الحرجة للمسألة السورية وأهمية وقف الاعتداء والحفاظ على الحياة البشرية ستحظى بجل اهتماماتهم وجهودكم

Editor’s note: Rime Allaf, a Syrian writer, is an associate fellow at Chatham House in London. She is on Twitter as @rallaf.

(CNN) — It would be hard to claim surprise at the array of sanctions which were finally imposed on the Syrian regime in the last weeks, following months of seemingly endless warnings from friends and foes alike. Yet, judging by the reaction of various officials in Damascus, the regime does seem stunned by this shock to its system, having been living in denial about the evolving situation it created.

From the apex of its fortunes only a couple of years ago to the most severe isolation modern Syria has ever witnessed, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad regime has single-handedly managed the feat which no other detractor achieved: bringing the entire country, and of course the regime itself, to a dead-end from which it can no longer extricate itself.

While accustomed to U.S. sanctions since 1979, Syria had never been simultaneously cut off from Europe, Turkey and the Arab world, while also facing the most determined popular uprising the Arab world has yet seen. For refusing to stop its mass military campaign of repression throughout the country, which none of the neighbors or friendly nations could continue to ignore while urging for the proverbial promised reforms, the Syrian regime is now faced with a heavy bill it has no way of paying.

Taken separately, the various sets of sanctions could have been manageable, even if the hardships would still be passed on to the population under the usual empty slogans of sovereignty and resistance in the face of a global conspiracy. In response to the first set of EU sanctions, in fact, Foreign Minister Walid Muallem had told a press gathering that Syria would “forget that Europe was on the map” and turn eastward for its business. When the sanctions reached the oil sector, the Syrian regime boasted it would sell its crude to China, India and other “non-aligned” countries. However, with the increasing difficulties of dealing with a Central Bank under sanctions, even countries sympathetic to the Syrian regime have been unwilling to go through so much trouble just to acquire Syrian oil, which, to boot, is mostly a low-grade crude needing special refineries.

With Europe wiped off the map, the 150,000 barrels per day output which used to be exported across the Mediterranean will be difficult to sell, with very significant financial repercussions for the regime - and that was before the Arab League finally decided to tighten the screws.

It is possible that repeated warnings followed by recurring extensions of deadlines convinced the Syrian regime that Arab countries were bluffing, and that the legendary impotence of the Arab League would prevent real pressure from materializing; this could explain al-Assad’s bloody intransigence, and his erroneous interpretation that he really still had a carte blanche to kill, literally, the growing popular uprising which was now supplemented by armed resistance from an increasing number of defected soldiers, grouping themselves to form the Free Syrian Army.

When the announcement of sanctions finally fell on November 12, even with additional deadlines allowing the regime to accept a set of conditions (including Arab monitors) which could save it from isolation, al-Assad and his advisers seemed unprepared. Instead of astutely accepting the offer to avoid greater seclusion, they decided to retreat into the usual conspiracy rhetoric while trying to buy time with complaints about protocols: this merely allowed the Arab League to ensure near unanimity in its decision to isolate al-Assad.

All that remained was for Turkey to close the loop, and to carry out its own promise to punish the Syrian regime if it did not desist in what the UN has since described as crimes against humanity. As of this week, the Syrian regime is completely isolated, politically and financially. Even the reluctance of Lebanon and Iraq to apply full sanctions will be unlikely to make a big difference in Syria’s fortunes, especially as international pressure continues to mount.

The impact of this isolation cannot be exaggerated. While powerful allies such as Iran and Russia will try, for the time being, to pull their weight as they attempt to save the regime from its own folly, perhaps lending it limited financial support, a solid geographical reality imposes itself, cutting off Syria from most of the rest of the world.

There is no doubt that these measures will also hurt those who imposed them, and this is one of the reasons why they were so long in coming. For Turkey, not only has the zero problem with neighbors policy been shattered, but the Arab world opening it had carefully nurtured will be negatively affected if transport trucks must now take a long diversion through Iraq. This will take time, effort and resources which had not been expected.

The truth is that for all the propaganda spewed by the Syrian regime, few countries in the region want to see Syria completely isolated, if only for their own selfish reasons. Everyone is worried about potential civil strife and its effect on the region, but there is also an economic aspect: while losing trade with Syria might not make a difference to most neighbors, losing the trade route will.

The battered Syrian population will only feel more hardship as it struggles to overcome this unprecedented period in recent history, and the sanctions will affect people, economically, socially and politically. Indeed, even Syrians who do not actively support the revolution will feel the pain of remaining silent while the al-Assad regime entrenches itself with increasing violence, if that were possible.

Decades ago, the regime had been able to count on the population’s fear and on its acceptance of the broad argument of resistance in the face of imperialist aggression. Today, however, the imposed agony of sanctions coupled with the extreme brutality of the regime will probably push people to make a stand before it’s too late. The sooner this happens, the less likely the possibility of civil strife or of intervention in Syria.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Rime Allaf