09/12/12

Group linked to Al Qaeda in Iraq, Syrian rebels

capture northern outpost, capture 5 soldiers.

David Trifunov

A Syrian opposition fighter keeps the queue in order as people line up to buy bread outside a bakery in the al-Fardos neighbourhood of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on December 9, 2012. (ODD ANDERSEN/AFP/Getty Images)

Radical Islamists linked to Al Qaeda in Iraq have helped rebels capture a Syrian army outpost, Reuters reported today.

One of the more prominent groups, Jabhat al-Nusra, bolstered Syrians fighting against President Bashar al-Assad’s troops in the north.

Together, they captured five soldiers from the 111th regiment, according to Reuters.

Jabhat al-Nusra wants an Islamic state inside Syria, the newswire said, and is operating inside Syria despite its exclusion from a rebel leadership group.

While rebels claim to be closing in on the capital Damascus, US and Russian politicians are meeting with UN peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi to discuss the 20-month Syrian civil war.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said reports that his country is ready to soften its stance on Assad are wrong.

More from GlobalPost: Syrian rebels elect new command, target airport

After US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Lavrov and Brahimi late last week in Ireland, reports were that Russia has started to lose its patience with Assad.

That’s not true, Lavrov said, and Russia is only discussing Syria on the assurance a peace deal wouldn’t force him from power.

“We are not conducting any negotiations on the fate of Assad,” Lavrov said Sunday, according to The Associated Press.

“All attempts to portray things differently are unscrupulous, even for diplomats of those countries which are known to try to distort the facts in their favor.”

Also today, activists said nine Syrian judges and prosecutors from the city of Adlib defected.

They posted a video online and urged others to follow their lead, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told the AP.

08/12/12

Fierce battle between Bashar Al-Assad regime and opposition fighters near Damascus where at least 32 people killed

Syrian troops battled rebels near Damascus on Saturday and launched air strikes on opposition strongholds in the south of the capital and on its northeastern outskirts, a watchdog said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights gave an initial toll of 49 people killed nationwide, including 16 civilians and 16 rebels killed in Damascus province alone.

To the northeast of the capital, seven civilians including a child were killed in heavy army shelling on the town of Misraba.

Nearby, warplanes bombarded the town of Douma and areas between Harasta and Irbin, said the watchdog, adding that 10 rebels were killed in fierce clashes with troops in the area.

The Observatory also reported three rebels and two civilians killed in shelling on southern areas of the capital, including in Daraya, where troops had launched a major military operation to try and seize control of the town.

For several days, the army has pounded rebel strongholds on the capital’s outskirts, where the fighters have set up their rear bases, raising fears of a looming ground assault.

Abu Kinan, an activist in Daraya, said that clashes had broken out between the rebel Free Syrian Army and government troops to the east and west of Daraya.

“The army is getting reinforcements and has arrested more than 80 displaced people who were living in the surrounding areas, just because they are from Daraya,” he told AFP via Skype.

He said that the army had not yet succeeded in entering the town, the scene in August of the single deadliest massacre of the 21-month conflict.

State television reported that the army had “destroyed a number of vehicles and motorcycles used by terrorists” in Harasta and Daraya.

The Observatory said that the army mounted attacks on rebel positions near the borders with Turkey and Israel.

Air strikes struck the northern town of Tal Abyad near Turkey, the Britain-based watchdog said, while shells fell on the villages of Bir Ajam and Al-Buraykah in the Syrian side of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

In the northwestern province of Idlib, four men were killed in air strikes on the village of Kfar Lateh, and warplanes also bombed Maaret al-Numan and the nearby village of Has, killing two men and leaving 15 others wounded.

In Aleppo province in the north, warplanes pounded the towns of Aazaz and Jarablus, and targeted rebel positions around the Meng military airport which is ringed by several battalions.

More than 42,000 people have been killed since the uprising erupted in March last year, according to the Observatory, which relies on a network of activists, lawyers and medics on the ground.

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)

BEIRUT — At least 40,000 people have been killed in violence across Syria since the outbreak of an anti-regime revolt in March last year, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Thursday.

“At least 28,026 civilians, 1,379 defectors, 10,150 soldiers and 574 unidentified people have been killed in Syria in the past 20 months,” said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman.

Civilians represented the vast majority of the 40,129 people killed, said the Observatory, which includes non-military people who have taken up arms against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in that figure.

The Observatory did not include thousands of people who have gone missing in the conflict, some thought to be in detention and others slain. It also excluded thousands of dead pro-regime militiamen.

The Britain-based Observatory relies on a network of activists, lawyers and medics at military and civilian hospitals inside Syria for its information.

The uprising began as pro-reform protests inspired by the Arab Spring but transformed into an armed insurgency after the government began brutally crushing demonstrations.

Most rebels, like the population, are Sunni Muslims in a country dominated by a minority regime of Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

Nov 21/12

Syria’s army repelled a rebel attack Wednesday on a military base at Sheikh Suleiman, 25 kilometers northwest of the city of Aleppo, and killed at least 25 insurgents, a watchdog said.

Rebel fighters have besieged the base for several weeks, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. They have now been forced to pull back as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad win back ground in northwest Syria.

At least 25 rebel fighters were killed, said the Britain-based monitoring group, citing rebels.

The area was mined and came under aerial bombardment, it said.

Rebels seized the strategically located Base 46 late last week, according to the monitoring group. The base is a large military complex perched on a hill, and is also located near Syria’s second city Aleppo.

Base 46 was one of the army’s last remaining bases in the area bordering Turkey, which supports the revolt against Assad.

Rebels had aimed to expel the army from Sheikh Suleiman, as they edge towards declaring the “liberation” from regime hands of northwestern Syria.

In violence in the capital on Tuesday, a mortar shell smashed into an upmarket district that houses several embassies, killing one person and injuring several others, the Observatory and Syria’s official media said.

The blast in Abu Rummaneh marked the first time the wealthy district has been targeted since the March 2011 outbreak of the revolt against the regime.

Pro-government Al-Watan daily also reported the attack, saying “a mortar shell fell near the Madfaa garden in the district of Abu Rummaneh, causing casualties.” It did not elaborate.

On Wednesday, the army shelled the southern belt of Damascus and the town of Daraya southwest of the capital, said the Observatory, which relies on a network of activists, doctors and lawyers to compile and verify its data.

The group added that helicopters and warplanes were deployed over the capital’s Eastern Ghouta area as the army launched new operations to retake control of areas of Damascus province from the rebel Free Syrian Army.

At least 39,000 people have been killed across Syria since the outbreak of the revolt, according to the watchdog.

Nov 14/12 #Syria

Syrian army tanks shelled a refugee camp and two nearby districts in southern Damascus on Wednesday as battles raged and warplanes bombarded a rebel-held northwestern town, a watchdog said.

The tanks were deployed at the Palestinian camp of Yarmuk overnight, as well as the nearby districts of Tadamun and Assali, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Both Yarmuk and Tadamun were the scene of battles between the army and rebels late on Tuesday, said the Britain-based Observatory.

On Wednesday morning, shells were fired into a second refugee camp east of Yarmuk, said the monitoring group, though it did not specify if they had been fired by the army or by rebels.

Fighting in Damascus has intensified in recent weeks, after the army put down a mid-summer rebel assault on districts particularly in the southern belt where anti-regime sentiment is strong.

The violence is linked to major, ongoing battles in several parts of Damascus province, chiefly in the area known as Eastern Ghuta east of the capital.

Elsewhere, fighter jets bombarded a rebel-held town in the northwestern province of Idlib, the watchdog said.

“The air force has carried out two air strikes on the town of Maaret al-Numan,” said the Observatory.

Rebels seized Maaret al-Numan on October 9, and the army has since waged an unrelenting but unsuccessful offensive to take back the town strategically located on the highway linking Damascus and second city Aleppo.

The Observatory – which relies on activists, doctors and lawyers for its information — says more than 37,000 people have been killed in Syria since the anti-regime revolt broke out in March 2011.

-AFP

Published on 1 Nov 2012 by AlJazeeraEnglish

27/10/12

Reports of renewed fighting unravels

temporary #Syrian truce

(CNN) — An early morning explosion rocked the flashpoint city of Deir Ezzor on Saturday in an attack that further eroded an already shaky temporary cease-fire called over the observance of a four-day Muslim holiday.

The Syrian government accused “terrorists” of detonating a car bomb outside a church, a claim that appeared to counter reports by opposition groups that a military police building was the target.

More violence flared in the Damascus suburb of Erbeen, where eight people were killed and several more wounded in a Syrian military airstrike, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based activist group.

The latest unrest follows opposition claims of more than 100 people killed in bomb blasts and clashes just hours after the truce began on Friday, coinciding with the start of the Eid al-Adha holiday.

Both sides in the civil war accused the other of violating the conditions of the cease-fire, with the government saying its soldiers were responding to “terrorist attacks” — a term routinely used by President Bashar al-Assad to describe rebel assaults.

U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi negotiated the truce with the hope of stemming the killings that have gripped the country since March 2011 when protesters inspired by the success of popular revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia took to the streets to demand the ouster of al-Assad.

More than 32,000 people, according to the opposition, have been killed in the fighting that followed a brutal crackdown on demonstrators.

CNN could not confirm reports of casualties or violence as access to the country by international journalists has been severely restricted.

With the attack in Deir Ezzor, one of the centers of heavy fighting in recent months, hopes dimmed that the cease-fire would still take hold for the remainder of the religious holiday.

The government said the explosion damaged the facade of the church, according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency.

Syrian forces, meanwhile, fired a volley of mortar rounds at Sunni-dominated neighborhoods in what appeared to be a retaliation for the bombing, Hani al-Thafiri, an opposition activist working in the city, told CNN.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the car bomb.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also reported the explosion, which it described as being near a restaurant, and subsequent clashes. The group said at least five civilians had been killed, while the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria said two civilians died.

Both groups reported clashes between Syrian forces and rebel fighters in parts of Idlib province, as well as rocket fire and heavy shelling by government forces. The LCC also reported mortar fire in the Aleppo, Damascus and Hama areas.

Across Syria on Saturday, the LCC claimed 12 people were killed. Among the dead were the casualties in Deir Ezzor as well as six others who were killed in clashes in the capital city of Damascus.

The civil war has been playing out largely along sectarian lines with predominantly Sunni rebels trying to unseat al-Assad and his Alawite minority.

Al-Assad is himself an Alawite, which has distant ties to the Shiite faith.

The sectarian split in fighting has also spilled over into a diplomatic divide, with al-Assad backed by Shiite-dominated Iran and the rebels receiving support from Sunni-led Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.

World leaders have condemned the civil war and repeatedly called on al-Assad to step down.

Efforts by the U.N. Security Council to stop the violence have been at a standstill, with Russia and China refusing to go along with the United States, France and others’ call for intervention.

Russia, a Cold War ally of Syria, has said Syrians should decide the outcome of the uprising not the United Nations.

27/10/12

27/10/12

Syrian rebels clashed with Kurdish militia in the northern city of Aleppo, leaving 30 dead and some 200 captured, a watchdog said Saturday, sparking fears of a new front in an already fractured country.

The fighting between armed rebels and members of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), the Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), erupted on Friday in the majority Kurdish neighborhood of Ashrafieh, it said.

“There were 30 people – Arabs and Kurds – killed in the fighting, including 22 combatants from both sides,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement, adding that Ashrafieh is now under PYD militia control.

Scores of people were then captured, mostly by the rebels, the Observatory said.

“More than 200 people have been kidnapped,” Observatory Director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP. “Some 20 rebels were kidnapped by the PYD. The rest of the those kidnapped are Kurds.”

The area had been relatively free of the violence that has rattled Aleppo since fighting between regime forces and armed rebels erupted in the city on July 20.

But on Thursday, residents said some 200 rebels moved into the district, announcing they had come to spend the Eid al-Adha Muslim holidays, starting the next day, in the area.

“Snipers have set up in the buildings and 50 armed men, dressed in black and wearing headbands with Islamic slogans, entered a school near me. I heard them tell the residents: ‘We are here to spend Eid with you’,” one resident said soon after the rebel force arrived.

“I am waiting for things to calm down before leaving,” he said.

The fighting came the next day – on Friday, coinciding with the first day of a truce between Syria’s warring parties which has largely been ignored by all.

Syria’s Kurdish minority has on the whole remained neutral during the country’s civil war, which has sown divisions among the country’s patchwork of ethnic and religious groups.

The conflict, which has pitted the army, security forces and pro-regime militias against rebel fighters since a revolt against Assad morphed into an armed insurgency, has left at least 35,000 people dead, according to the Observatory.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist group by Ankara, the United States and the European Union, took up arms in the Kurdish-majority southeast of Turkey in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed about 45,000 lives

27/10/12

Beirut
(Reuters) - Opposition activists in Syria said forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad had renewed their heavy bombardment of major cities on Saturday, further undermining a truce meant to mark the Muslim Eid al-Adha religious holiday.

The bombardment came on the second day of the truce called by international peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who had hoped to use it to build broader momentum to end the 19-month-old conflict which has killed an estimated 32,000 people.

“The army began firing mortars at 7 a.m. I have counted 15 explosions in one hour and we already have two civilians killed,” said Mohammed Doumany, an activist from the Damascus suburb of Douma, where pockets of rebels are based. “I can’t see any difference from before the truce and now,” he said.

Heavy machine gunfire and the sound of mortar bombs could be heard for the second consecutive day along the Turkey-Syria border near the Syrian town of Haram, a Reuters witness said.

Activists in the eastern city of Deir al-Zor and in Aleppo, where rebels control roughly half of Syria’s most populous city, said that mortar bombs were being fired into residential areas.

Residents in Damascus aired footage of fighter jets which they said were bombing the suburbs of Erbin and Harasta.

The Syrian army said it had responded to attacks by insurgents on its positions on Friday, in line with its earlier announcement that it would cease military activity during the holiday while reserving the right to react to rebel actions.

A statement from the General Command of the Armed Forces detailed several ceasefire violations in which it said “terrorists” had fired on checkpoints and bombed a military police patrol in Aleppo.

More than 150 people were killed on Friday, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based opposition organisation with a network of sources within Syria.

Most were shot by sniper fire or in clashes, the Observatory said, highlighting a temporary drop-off in the civil war’s intensity in which Assad’s forces have been conducting daily airstrikes and heavy artillery raids in most cities.

Forty-three soldiers were killed in ambushes and during clashes, it said, while state TV reported a powerful car bomb which had killed five people in Damascus.

TRUCE BREACHES

Violence had initially appeared to wane in some areas on Friday but truce breaches by both sides swiftly marred Syrians’ hopes of celebrating Eid al-Adha, the climax of the Haj pilgrimage to Mecca, in peace.

Brahimi’s ceasefire appeal had won widespread international support, including from Russia, China and Iran, President Assad’s main foreign allies.

But there are few signs that either side in the conflict has respected the truce. A Reuters cameraman in the Turkish border village of Besaslan in southern Hatay province said he could hear the sound of a helicopter circling on the Syrian side of the border.

Turkish ambulances were ferrying wounded people from an unofficial border crossing for treatment in Turkey.

The war in Syria pits mainly Sunni Muslim rebels against Assad, who is from the minority Alawite sect which is distantly related to Shi’ite Islam. Brahimi has warned that the conflict could suck in Sunni and Shi’ite powers across the Middle East.

Brahimi’s predecessor, former U.N. chief Kofi Annan, declared a ceasefire in Syria on April 12, but it soon fell flat, along with the rest of his six-point peace plan.

Divided international powers have been unable to stop the violence with the West condemning Assad but blaming Russia, Iran and China for supporting Damascus.

Russia’s deputy foreign minister Gennady Gatilov tweeted on Saturday that “Westerners” in the United Nations Security Council had prevented the body from condemning a bomb attack in Damascus on Friday, which the Syrian government blames on rebels it labels as “terrorists.”

“(The Syria opposition’s) course for continuation of violence is self-evident,” Gatilov said.

(Reporting by Oliver Holmes, Mert Ozkan in Besaslan, Gleb Bryanski in Moscow and Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

26/10/12

• Arab League: Observers deployed in late December to oversee compliance with a peace plan that included an end to violence, the withdrawal of troops from the streets and the release of political prisoners. But the monitoring mission was suspended after little more than a month as fighting continued.
• Kofi Annan: Six-point plan for Syria included the withdrawal of troops and heavy weapons from urban areas, and an open-ended ceasefire that was meant to take effect on 12 April and lead to peace talks. But neither side fully adhered to the plan and violence continued to escalate.
• Lakhdar Brahimi: New UN-Arab League envoy toured the Middle East in October, seeking support for a ceasefire over the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha, which starts 26 October. The truce, backed by the UN Security Council, is designed to kick-start political reconciliati

25/10/12

Syria’s army command said it will suspend military operations to mark the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, declaring a ceasefire from Friday morning to Monday but saying it reserved the right to respond to rebel attacks and bombings.

   
It said it would also respond to “terrorist groups trying to reinforce their positions by arming themselves and getting reinforcements” as well as neighbouring countries facilitating the smuggling of fighters across borders during that period.

This as a body belonging to priest Fadi Haddad was found in the area of Reef Damascus earlier.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a few days ago anonymous gunmen kidnapped the priest. Fadi Haddad was the Minister of the St. Elias Greek Orthodox Church in the city of Katna in Damascus Reef.

A resident reported that the body was found in the nearby town of Drousheh, stressing that the priest was “savagely slaughtered.”

In this context, President Bashar al-Assad’s forces fired heavy tank and rocket barrages at a Damascus suburb on Thursday, killing five people, opposition activists said, a day before a UN-brokered ceasefire is due to come into force.
   
The fighting in Harasta, just northeast of Damascus, erupted after rebels overran two army roadblocks on the edge of the large town, which is on the main highway linking the capital to the country’s north, they said.
   
“Harasta is being pummeled by tanks and rocket launchers deployed in the highway. The rebels are putting up a fight and it does not seem the army will be able to enter the town this time,” Mohammad, a Damascus resident, said by phone.
   
He was referring to the last armored incursion by loyalist forces into Harasta a month ago, which opposition campaigners said had killed 70 people.
   
Harasta is one of a series of large Sunni Muslim suburbs ringing the Syrian capital that have been at the forefront of the 19-month-old rebellion against Assad.
   
He belongs to the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam that has dominated Syrian politics since the 1960s.
   
The Harasta Media Office opposition activists’ group described the town as a “disaster zone” following the shelling.
   
“An (army) roadblock had been set up next to the main bakery. There is no water, no food, no medicine and prolonged power cuts,” it said in a statement.
   
Other residents of Damascus said the sound of shelling targeting Harasta and the nearby neighbourhood of Zamalka could be heard from the center of the capital.
   
On Wednesday, an Arab League mediator for the Syrian conflict told the U.N. Security Council that Assad has accepted a ceasefire for the Muslim ‘Eid’ holiday starting on Friday.
   
An announcement by the Syrian authorities was expected later. But Moaz al-Shami, an opposition activist in Damascus said “no one is taking the ceasefire seriously”.
   
“How can there be a ceasefire with tanks roaming the streets, roadblocks every few hundred meters and the army having no qualms about hitting civilian neighborhoods with heavy artillery? This is a regime that has lost all credibility.”


International Positions:

United Nations war crimes investigators said on Thursday they had asked to meet Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to seek access for their team, which has been shut out of the country since being set up a year ago.   

The team, led by Brazilian expert Paulo Pinheiro, has been gathering evidence and testimony on atrocities committed by Syrian government forces and armed rebels in the 19-month-old conflict.

Carla del Ponte, a former U.N. war crimes prosecutor who has joined the inquiry, was asked about similarities with past investigations including those into war crimes in former Yugoslavia. “The similarity is of course we are handling the same crimes, crimes against humanity and war crimes for sure,” she said.

For its part, China called on Thursday for all sides in the Syrian conflict to observe U.N.-Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi’s proposal for a Muslim holiday ceasefire. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said he welcomed the move.


Iraqi fears:

Iraqi Shiites increasingly fear the Muslim sect and its holy sites could be targeted in neighboring Syria as the civil war there takes on increasingly sectarian overtones, and Iranian-backed militants are girding for violence in both countries, according to Shiite leaders and government officials.
 
     
The Iraqi concerns center on the role ultraconservative Sunnis might play in Syria should President Bashar Assad be forced from power, and on what they see as growing threats to the revered Sayyida Zainab mosque complex outside Damascus.