Bullets fly as Syrians take to the street

SYRIAN troops fired on thousands of protesters who spilled out of mosques after prayers yesterday, as the latest diplomatic efforts failed to halt more than 13 months of bloodshed in the country.

State media reported that a roadside bomb killed 10 soldiers as the United Nations warned the country’s infrastructure was under strain.

The peace plan proposed by Kofi Annan – the international envoy to the country – has unravelled over the past week. The UN hopes to have 30 ceasefire monitors in Syria next week and plans are being made for the deployment of up to 300, though Syria is still balking at UN demands that observers use their own helicopters and planes to visit hotspots.

The organisation is also trying to ramp up its humanitarian response and send more food, medicine and aid workers to Syria, said John Ging, the head of emergency response at the UN’s office for the co-ordination of humanitarian affairs.

“The whole infrastructure of the country is under strain,” Mr Ging said. He added that the Syrian regime has finally acknowledged that there is a “serious humanitarian need” and that this should ease the aid mission.

The UN estimates some 230,000 Syrians have been displaced and more than 9,000 killed since the uprising against president Bashar Assad erupted more than a year ago.

Mr Annan’s ceasefire that technically went into effect last week has been steadily unravelling, with regime forces continuing to shell rebel-held areas in the central city of Homs and opposition fighters ambushing government troops. However, the truce is still seen as the most viable way to end the bloodshed, simply for a lack of other options.

UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon took a hard line against Damascus, saying Syria was not honouring the ceasefire and that violence was escalating.

Yesterday, protests were reported in the capital Damascus and its suburbs, as well as in the northern city of Aleppo, the central regions of Hama and Homs, in eastern towns near the border with Iraq and in the southern province of Daraa.

Demonstrators spilled out from mosques onto the streets, calling for Mr Assad’s downfall and chanting in support of the country’s rebel forces, activists said.

“Security is extremely tight in Damascus,” said activist Maath al-Shami, adding that despite the heavy presence of plainclothes security agents, there were protests in the capital’s neighbourhoods of Qaboun, Midan, Barzeh and Mazzeh.

He said troops fired in the air to disperse the protesters. Activists also said troops opened fire at protesters in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, as well as the central city of Hama. They had no immediate word on casualties.

In the rebel-held Khaldiyeh neighbourhood in the central city of Homs, a mortar round was striking every five minutes, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The observatory said eight civilians were killed in Homs yesterday, including a family of three whose home was struck by a shell. The group reported three more civilians were killed by army fire in other parts of Syria.

Meanwhile, Syria’s state-run news agency Sana said a large roadside bomb went off in the southern village of Sahm al-Golan, near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, killing 10 soldiers.