Dubai: A day after a dramatic withdrawal of army tanks from the restive city of Hama, 210km north of Damascus, Syrian forces re-entered other towns of Idlib, north of Hama, the Qusair area of Homs and killed at least 11, according to sources from the Coordination Committee of Peaceful Syrian Revolution in the province.
"The regime will play with Turkey and with the rest of the international community pretending that it was pulling out of cities, but killing of civilians will continue," activist Abu Omar Al Hamawi commented on the redeployment of tanks and security forces in Hama and the neighbouring provinces.
Machine-gun fire
On Wednesday, security forces shot dead 18 people in the Baba Amro neighbourhood of Homs with more than 100 wounded "some in critical condition," he said.
It said residents were fleeing for safety while heavy machine-gun fire rattled Baba Amro well into the morning yesterday.
The White House was expected yesterday to call explicitly for President Bashar Al Assad to step down — a long-awaited move that would sharply escalate international condemnation of the regime's bloody crackdown on anti-government protesters, The Financial Times said.
The US has been steadily increasing pressure on Al Assad's regime. Following the killing of demonstrators in the past week, the White House was preparing on Wednesday night to issue a call for Al Assad to stand down.
It was still being decided whether the call would be made by President Barack Obama or his spokesman, Jay Carney, officials said, according to Financial Times.
The uprising today enters its 150-day with documented 2,485 civilians killed, including 200 children, and 15,000 injured, according to Human Rights organisations.
"More than 20,000 people were arrested and about 15,000 have left the country to neighbouring Lebanon and Turkey," Dr Ammar Qurabi, Chief of the Syrian National Human Rights Organisation, told Gulf News.
Marking the 150th day of the revolution, this Friday (today) was tagged as "We will never Kneel to the Tyrant. We are not going to accept empty promises from the regime, which has a fixed policy of killing, arresting and firing at protesters," Al Hamawi said.
Meanwhile, emerging powers India, Brazil and South Africa urged the regime to show restraint and respect for human rights at a meeting in Damascus with Al Assad.
Call for restraint
The countries "called for an immediate end to all violence and urged all sides to act with utmost restraint and respect for human rights and international human rights law", the joint statement said.
The statement, also released at the United Nations late on Wednesday, said Al Assad had admitted to the delegation that his security forces had made "some mistakes" in battling the protests.
