“It’s a choice between the Annan plan on the one hand really implemented, or a situation of increasing chaos.”
Russia and China have so far refused to countenance any UN-backed sanctions against Syria. However, Western diplomats are hoping that a new resolution, which makes them conditional on breaches of the peace plan, could prove a new way forward.
Both the Syrian government and the opposition, for different reasons, rejected yesterday descriptions of the conflict as having descended into “civil war”.
But there were running battles between regime forces and the Free Syrian Army in cities across the country, including in and around the capital Damascus.
The Vatican’s ambassador to Syria said it had started its descent into hell.
Nuncio Mario Zenari would not be drawn on whether the country was in the midst of a “civil war”, but he said “the impression prevails [that for] the people a descent into hell has started”.
Overnight, the FSA withdrew from the town of Haffa, north-east of Lattakia, after several days of intense bombardment. The Syrian army moved in during the morning, with state media declaring it was “cleansing the area of terrorists”.
“The authorities pursued the remaining terrorists in the villages surrounding Haffa and killed and arrested a number of them,” it said.
Tens of thousands of residents of the town, normally 40,000 strong, have fled in recent days. Turkey said 2,500 Syrian refugees had crossed its border nearby in the previous two days alone. Seema Nassar, an activist speaking from Lattakia, said Haffa had been left a “ghost town”, and that residents of nearby villages, which are mostly Alawite and loyal to the Assad family, had entered and burned houses. She said 150 men who had been in the town had been seized.
According to one credible report, families of 14 men on a lorry stopped at a checkpoint as it was trying to leave the town lost contact with them shortly afterwards.
Heavy fighting continued in other parts of Syria yesterday. Regime forces bombarded the Sunni town of Anadan, near Aleppo, an opposition stronghold, killing 15 people, including six children under the age of 12, according to the Syrian Network of Human Rights. The town’s mosque was hit by shellfire, it said, and pro-Assad Shahiba militia set it on fire, leaving sectarian graffiti on the walls.
A spokesman for the group said that more than 50 people were confirmed dead in the country by yesterday afternoon.
A searing report due to be released today by Amnesty International, whose researcher travelled incognito in the country over the past two months, described a pattern of indiscriminate violence used by the regime on opposition areas.
“Soldiers and Shabiha militias burned down homes and properties and fired indiscriminately into residential areas, killing and injuring civilian bystanders,” it said. “Those who were arrested, including the sick and elderly, were routinely tortured, sometimes to death. Many have been subjected to enforced disappearance; their fate remains unknown.”
Russia and China have so far refused to countenance any UN-backed sanctions against Syria. However, Western diplomats are hoping that a new resolution, which makes them conditional on breaches of the peace plan, could prove a new way forward.
Both the Syrian government and the opposition, for different reasons, rejected yesterday descriptions of the conflict as having descended into “civil war”.
But there were running battles between regime forces and the Free Syrian Army in cities across the country, including in and around the capital Damascus.
The Vatican’s ambassador to Syria said it had started its descent into hell.
Nuncio Mario Zenari would not be drawn on whether the country was in the midst of a “civil war”, but he said “the impression prevails [that for] the people a descent into hell has started”.
Overnight, the FSA withdrew from the town of Haffa, north-east of Lattakia, after several days of intense bombardment. The Syrian army moved in during the morning, with state media declaring it was “cleansing the area of terrorists”.
“The authorities pursued the remaining terrorists in the villages surrounding Haffa and killed and arrested a number of them,” it said.
Tens of thousands of residents of the town, normally 40,000 strong, have fled in recent days. Turkey said 2,500 Syrian refugees had crossed its border nearby in the previous two days alone. Seema Nassar, an activist speaking from Lattakia, said Haffa had been left a “ghost town”, and that residents of nearby villages, which are mostly Alawite and loyal to the Assad family, had entered and burned houses. She said 150 men who had been in the town had been seized.
According to one credible report, families of 14 men on a lorry stopped at a checkpoint as it was trying to leave the town lost contact with them shortly afterwards.
Heavy fighting continued in other parts of Syria yesterday. Regime forces bombarded the Sunni town of Anadan, near Aleppo, an opposition stronghold, killing 15 people, including six children under the age of 12, according to the Syrian Network of Human Rights. The town’s mosque was hit by shellfire, it said, and pro-Assad Shahiba militia set it on fire, leaving sectarian graffiti on the walls.
A spokesman for the group said that more than 50 people were confirmed dead in the country by yesterday afternoon.
A searing report due to be released today by Amnesty International, whose researcher travelled incognito in the country over the past two months, described a pattern of indiscriminate violence used by the regime on opposition areas.
“Soldiers and Shabiha militias burned down homes and properties and fired indiscriminately into residential areas, killing and injuring civilian bystanders,” it said. “Those who were arrested, including the sick and elderly, were routinely tortured, sometimes to death. Many have been subjected to enforced disappearance; their fate remains unknown.”