Syrian security forces and unidentified gunmen killed at least 19 civilians yesterday, including an eight-year-old boy, the head of the National Organisation for Human Rights in Syria, Ammar Qurabi, said.
Sniper fire killed 13 people, including the youngster, in the village of Al-Harra, near the protest centre of Daraa, south of the capital Damascus, Qurabi said.
Tank fire killed five people in the Baba Amr district on the outskirts of the central industrial city of Homs. Another civilian died in Jassem, near Daraa, Qurabi added.
Earlier yesterday two Syrian soldiers were killed in clashes with “terrorists,” as authorities continued to chased regime opponents and activists spoke of several bodies littering the streets of a neighbourhood in the flashpoint city of Homs.
EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said the bloc will look at fresh sanctions this week against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime after already homing in on his inner circle.
In the face of the persistent violence, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees suspended operations for 50,000 people in central and southern Syria, while UN chief Ban Ki-moon called for an end to “excessive force.”
Two soldiers were killed and five others wounded in clashes with “armed terrorist gangs” in the protest hubs of Homs and Daraa, state news agency Sana reported.
The deadly confrontations occurred as troops and security forces “arrested dozens of wanted men and seized large quantities of weapons and ammunition in the Bab Amr neighbourhood of Homs” and in Daraa.
A human rights activist said shelling and automatic weapons fire had rocked Homs, a central industrial city that is Syria’s third largest and has been the target of a security operation since Monday.
“This operation terrified residents and security agents took part in looting,” human rights activist Najati Tayara said, adding that 50 tanks rolled into the Sittin neighbourhood.
Another activist spoke of “bodies sprawled on the streets in Bab Amr,” adding that “no one dares retrieve them because of the snipers and the security forces.”
Rights groups say nine people were killed yesterday in Homs but the report could not be independently verified. The army also kept up its sweep of the flashpoint Mediterranean town of Banias, scouting for “protest organisers yet to be arrested,” said Rami Abdul Rahman of the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
“A tank has been stationed since Tuesday night on the square where Banias demonstrations are held,” he said, adding that the northern town remained encircled by the army after weekend arrests put some 450 people behind bars.