Tag Archives: Syria

Where’s Bashar?

Mystery surrounded the whereabouts of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Thursday, as battles raged in the center of Damascus a day after a bomber killed his top security chiefs.

On Thursday morning, residents said there was no let-up in the heaviest fighting to hit the city in a 16-month revolt against Assad’s rule, now into its fifth day.

The fighting came within sight of the presidential palace, near the security headquarters where the bomber struck a crisis meeting of defense and security chiefs.

 

No Sign Of Assad After Bomb Kills Kin, Battles Rage (Reuters)

Oh, it’s on.

Russia has indicated that it will no longer stand in the way of the departure of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad if that is what Syrians want. The comments by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov come despite Russia’s insistence that there should be no external intervention in the escalating Syrian conflict. While the Russian remarks remain obscure on how that political transition might be achieved, they suggest a weakening of Moscow’s backing for Assad in the midst of growing international calls for his departure.


Russia Backs Assad’s Departure ‘If That Is What Syrians Want’ (Guardian)

“My son had a hernia and needed to be operated on [in Syria]. I left him for just a minute, and that’s when the soldiers came into the hospital. By the time I got back to my son’s room, his insides were outside his body. He has had four operations so far. They say a small bullet or shrapnel hit him, cut him open. I have spent a year like this, watching him suffer.” Fadia al-Abdo, 27, with her year-old son Mohammad Dali

“I have lost my brother, the dearest thing to me.” Salha, 13

“I was ordered to fire live ammunition at protesters. It was unbearable.” Mohammad Khalaf al-Ugla, 25

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63a1vKJLN10&feature=player_embedded

Secretly shot video footage aired last night by Channel 4 shows what it said were Syrian patients being tortured by medical staff at a state-run hospital in Homs. The station said it had obtained footage  at the military hospital in Homs, filmed covertly by an employee and smuggled out by a French photojournalist identified only as “Mani.”

 

Secret Footage Showing ‘torture’ Of Syrians In Homs hospital (Telegraph)

McCain Calls For Airstrikes On Syria; US, Europe Ask Putin To Aid International Diplomacy (Washington Post)

In addition, another Irish company, AdaptiveMobile Security Ltd., which is also based in Dublin, has supplied message- filtering technology to MTN Syria, the country’s second-largest mobile operator, according to four people familiar with that system. While AdaptiveMobile executives declined to comment for this story, in interviews last year concerning the sale of its product to a mobile operator in Iran, they said its technology is for blocking spam, viruses and inappropriate content, not political repression.

 

Syria Bars Text Messages With Irish-Made Gear (Bloomberg)

Thanks Corazon
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