Syrian observer mission in turmoil as Saudi Arabia pulls out

REPORTING FROM CAIRO AND DAMASCUS, SYRIA -- Saudi Arabia said Sunday that it was pulling its observers out of Syria because it sees no evidence that Damascus is complying with an Arab League initiative to end months of bloodshed.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al Faisal made the announcement at a meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo to decide whether to continue the mission, whose one-month mandate expired Thursday.

He urged the international community, including Syrian allies Russia and China, to use “all possible pressure” to persuade President Bashar Assad’s government to implement the plan calling for the withdrawal of government forces from cities and residential areas, the release of political prisoners, free access for the media and dialogue with its opponents.

The league’s ministerial committee on Syria met earlier Sunday to consider a report by the mission’s head, Sudanese Lt. Gen. Mohammed Ahmed Dabbi.

The committee recommended that the league continue the mission, which can be extended for another month with the approval of Assad’s government. It also urged Arab foreign ministers to increase the number of observers in the country, which currently stand at about 165, and provide them with additional technical support.

The recommendations came despite complaints from opposition and human rights activists that the observer mission has only bought the Syrian government more time to pursue a violent crackdown against dissent.

Security forces have killed as many as 976 people since the mission began in December, including 28 women and 54 children, according to the Local Coordination Committees, a network of opposition activists who organize protests and document the violence. In all, more than 5,000 people have been killed since the start of major anti-government protests in March, according to United Nations estimates.

Dabbi defended the mission over the weekend, saying it was not designed to stop the killings but to verify the government’s compliance with the peace plan agreed to in November.

The emir of Qatar, which orchestrated Syria’s suspension from the league and the imposition of sweeping sanctions against the country, has called for the deployment of Arab forces to “stop the killing” -- a proposal reiterated Sunday by the country’s foreign minister.

"The reality is that the bloodshed hasn't stopped,” Sheik Hamad ibn Jassim ibn Al-Thani said in Cairo. “What is needed now is a total revision of the mission's work.”

Syria has rejected Qatar’s proposal and vowed to defend its sovereignty. Syrian officials accuse Qatar of provisioning and financing “armed gangs” that they say have killed more than 2,000 security force members.

What began as a mostly peaceful uprising has turned more violent in recent months as military defectors and other opposition supporters have taken up arms against the government, raising fears that Syria could slide into civil war.

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-- Amro Hassan in Cairo and Alexandra Zavis in Damascus. Rima Marrouch in Damascus contributed to this report.

Photo: Anti-Syrian government protesters gather at a square in the mountain resort town of Zabadani on Friday. Credit: Associated Press

Arab troops should be dispatched to Syria, Qatar emir says

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT --  Arab troops should be dispatched to Syria to halt bloodshed that has shown no sign of abating despite the presence of Arab League observers in the country, the emir of Qatar has suggested, the first time an Arab head of state has called for military intervention in the country.

“For such a situation to stop the killing ... some troops should go to stop the killing,” Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani said in an interview with the CBS program “60 Minutes” airing Sunday, according to excerpts published on the CBS News website.

The statement is likely to infuriate the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. The small Persian Gulf emirate, which once had good relations with Syria, has become a leading voice for change in Syria after assuming a similar role in Libya.

Last summer, Qatar withdrew its ambassador from Damascus, the Syrian capital. Al Jazeera, the pan-Arab news network created by the emir, helped fan revolts across the Middle East and North Africa.

Al Jazeera “caused us a lot of problems with the top people in the Arab countries,” the emir told CBS. But he stopped short of suggesting that the network was directly responsible for the ousting of longtime autocrats such as Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and slain Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi, according to the excerpts.

Qatar asks U.N. to help monitors in Syria

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT -- Qatar's prime minister says he has asked for help from the United Nations  for the Arab League’s observer mission in Syria, according to news reports.

The mission, which is monitoring Syria's compliance with a regional peace initiative, has faced heavy criticism from opposition groups and some human rights activists who say it is providing cover for the  continuing crackdown on dissenters by the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Prime Minister Sheik Hamad bin Jassim al Thani met with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in New York on Wednesday.

"We are coming here for technical help and to see the experience the U.N. has, because this is the first time the Arab League is involved in sending monitors, and there are some mistakes," Jassim  was quoted as saying by Kuwait's state news agency, KUNA.

He did not specify the mistakes, according to the Kuwaiti report. Activists have complained that the mission is too small and too reliant on the government for security and logistics. They have accused Syrian authorities of attempting to mislead the observers by moving village signs and hiding detainees, and they say some victims are afraid to approach the monitors because of their security escorts. The Arab Parliament, a league advisory body, has declared the mission a failure and called for the monitors to be withdrawn. 

The Syrian government denies that it is interfering with the observer mission.

Adnan Khudair, who heads the mission operations room at Arab League headquarters in Cairo, called on all sides Thursday “not to rush to judgments.” 

He said about 150 monitors would be in the country by the end of the week, and a league ministerial committee will review their preliminary findings Sunday.

This week, Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby said the government had taken steps to comply with the league’s peace plan, including withdrawing tanks from cities and releasing nearly 3,500 political prisoners.

State television reported Thursday that 552 more detainees had been released.  But opposition activists said thousands of people remain behind bars, and more are arrested every day.

The United Nations says more than 5,000 people have been killed since the start of major antigovernment protests in March. As many as 24 people were reported killed across the country Thursday, according to the Local Coordination Committees, a coalition of activist groups that organizes protests and documents the violence.

The government says that what it describes as foreign-backed armed terrorists are to blame for the violence and that most of the casualties are security personnel. 

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 -- Alexandra Zavis. Rima Marrouch contributed to this report.

Photo: A photo released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency shows an Arab League observer wearing an orange vest during a tour in the village of Dael in Dara province. 

 

 

 



Arab League may seek U.N. backing for Syria plan

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT -- The Arab League is considering seeking U.N. Security Council backing for a a long-stalled regional initiative aimed at ending Syria’s bloody crackdown on dissent, Qatar’s foreign minister said Saturday.

The proposal comes after Syria repeatedly flouted deadlines to agree to observers to monitor compliance with the league-negotiated peace plan, which calls for a halt to hostilities, the withdrawal of security forces from urban areas and dialogue with the opposition.

Arab foreign ministers will meet in Cairo on Wednesday to consider asking the Security Council to adopt the plan, Sheik Hamad bin Jassim al Thani told reporters after a meeting of a league ministerial committee in Qatar’s capital, Doha.

The 22-member regional bloc has been divided over whether to ask the U.N. to intercede in Syria, with some nations concerned that it could set the stage for the kind of military intervention that helped topple President Moammar Kadafi in Libya.

"We are not talking about military action, but we will ask the Security Council to adopt the Arab initiative," Jassim said, according to wire service reports.

Syria faces Arab League deadline to allow monitors

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT — Syria indicated Sunday that it might be willing to allow Arab monitors into the country after the Arab League threatened to tighten sanctions against President Bashar Assad’s increasingly isolated regime and to seek the help of the United Nations to end a violent crackdown against dissent.

Arab foreign ministers have given Syria until Sunday to sign their proposal for the observer mission, part of a league-negotiated plan agreed to by Syria last month to end the bloodshed. Syrian officials, who have ignored numerous previous deadlines, maintain they are committed to the plan, but have concerns about how the monitors would operate.

"Messages are being exchanged between Syria and the Arab League to reach a certain vision that would facilitate the mission of observers in Syria, while preserving Syrian interests and sovereignty," Syrian Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi told reporters in Damascus, according to the Associated Press.

Qatar's foreign minister, Sheik Hamad bin Jassim al Thani, said Syria had sent the league a number of requests for clarification, which had been answered.

"We asked the Syrian foreign minister to come tomorrow and sign the paper in the event of their consent. And we are awaiting an answer from them,” Jassim told reporters Saturday in Doha, the Qatari capital.

He reiterated that failure to sign the protocol could lead to U.N. involvement, but did not elaborate.

Syria's suspension from Arab League takes effect

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT -- Arab foreign ministers on Wednesday gave Syria three days to cease what one official called its “bloody repression” against its people or face economic sanctions, the latest sign of President Bashar Assad's growing isolation.

The move came after Syria’s humiliating suspension from the Arab League took effect.

The 22-member organization had decided Saturday that it would suspend Syria by Wednesday if it did not implement a league-brokered peace plan. It was an unusually robust action by an alliance often criticized in the past as feckless and irrelevant.

Sheik Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani, the foreign minister of Qatar, said at a news conference after a meeting Wednesday in Rabat, Morocco, that Arab states had “reached the end of the line” with the “bloody repression” by Assad's government against dissidents, the news agency Agence France-Presse reported.

Syria, which has called the suspension illegal and a product of U.S. pressure, boycotted the Morocco meetings, its chair sitting empty. Syria is a founding member of the Arab League and considers itself “the beating heart of Arab nationalism.”

The league’s decision to suspend Syria was a blow to its national prestige and prompted mass demonstrations by Assad loyalists, some of whom attacked the diplomatic missions of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey and France.

Arab League censure of Syria reverberates in region

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT — The Arab League's move to suspend Syria continued to send shock waves through the region Sunday, as Turkey decided to evacuate diplomatic families from Damascus, Saudi Arabia and Qatar condemned attacks on their embassies, and the official Syrian media claimed that millions of people demonstrated in support of President Bashar Assad.

Pro-Assad crowds attacked the Turkish embassy in Damascus after Saturday’s Arab League decision. The protesters chanted anti-Turkey slogans, hurled rocks and tried to force their way into the compound, Turkey's semi-official Anatolian news agency reported. Also attacked were Turkish missions in the Syrian cities of Aleppo and Latakia.

The attacks prompted Ankara to evacuate the families of embassy personnel in Damascus, Turkish media reported.

Turkey, which shares a more than 500-mile border with Syria, is not a member of the Arab League. But  Ankara has voiced strong public support for protesters in Syria who have been calling for Assad's ouster. Turkey also has provided refuge for Syrian dissidents, including army defectors operating along the border.

The Saudi Arabian and Qatari embassies in Damascus also were attacked, the Gulf Cooperation Council, a regional union, said in a statement. The council condemned the attacks and demanded that Syria bolster security measures.

Arab League awaits Syria's response on plan to end crisis

REPORTING FROM BEIRUT — Arab League ministers were awaiting a response from Syria on Monday to a plan designed to help end months of violent unrest in the Middle Eastern nation.

The league expects Syrian President Bashar Assad to respond with "concrete steps," Qatar’s foreign minister, Sheik Hamad ibn Jassim ibn Al-Thani, told reporters after a ministerial delegation met with Syrian representatives Sunday in Doha, Qatar's capital.

"The entire region is at risk of a massive storm," he said.

Many fear the violence in Syria could degenerate into a civil war, with reverberations for the entire region. Assad has vowed to resist any Libya-style foreign intervention. Protesters have demanded his ouster and said dialogue is not possible with his government, but the Arab League says it wants to foster dialogue to break the deadlock.