Syrian security forces stepped up a crackdown yesterday as activists said some 120 people were killed in a two-day spike in violence ahead of a bid to condemn Damascus at the UN Security Council.
The head of the Arab League monitoring mission in Syria said unrest had soared this week “in a significant way,” especially in the flashpoint central cities of Homs and Hama and in the northern Idlib region.
The violence, which yesterday for the first time cost lives in Aleppo, Syria’s second-largest city, “does not help ... to get all sides to sit at the negotiating table,” General Mohammed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi said.
For a second day, Syrian forces kept up their attacks on Homs, where dozens have died, as Western and Arab states rushed to unveil a draft UN resolution to condemn a crackdown that has killed more than 5,400 since March.
The assault since Thursday on Homs, and reports of offensives against Hama and other cities, came as the United Nations said it could no longer keep track of the death toll.
The Syrian Observatory of Human Rights said in its latest count that security forces killed at least 44 civilians yesterday, while 12 soldiers were killed in attacks on the military.
It said 19 people died in the southern province of Daraa, 15 in Homs, five in Aleppo, north Syria, three in Douma, just north of Damascus, including a child and woman, a boy on the outskirts of the capital, and another in Hama.
Six soldiers died in a car bomb attack on a security checkpoint in the city of Idlib and another six were killed in Daraa province in clashes with army deserters, the Britain-based watchdog’s head Rami Abdel Rahman said.
In violence across the country on Thursday, the Observatory said 62 people were killed, including 33 in Homs, a major protest hub and a tinderbox of sectarian tensions. The Observatory said Hama also came under assault by security forces early yesterday, with heavy machinegun fire and loud explosions heard.
On the outskirts of Damascus, an 11-year-old boy was killed at a checkpoint in Hamuriyeh, it said in statements received in Nicosia.
At least 384 children have been among the dead in the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, and almost the same number detained, the United Nations Children’s Fund said yesterday.
“As of January 7, 384 children have been killed; most are boys,” Rima Salah, acting UNICEF deputy executive director, said in Geneva. She said about 380 children have been detained, “some less than 14 years old.”
The Syrian National Council, the biggest opposition umbrella group, condemned the offensives against opposition strongholds and said it was in contact with members of the Security Council to press for strong condemnation.