Syria:Relief efforts by Red Cross stall as state reprisals continue

THE Red Cross delivered emergency aid to areas around the battered Baba Amro district of Homs yesterday, but was blocked for a third day from entering the former rebel bastion amid reports of bloody reprisals by state forces.

Activists reported shelling across Syria, sending one of the biggest surges of refugees across the border into Lebanon in a single day since a revolt against president Bashar al-Assad began a year ago.

Activists said the government was trying to prevent the Red Cross from witnessing “massacres” by Syrian soldiers.

“It’s over for tonight. We will try again tomorrow,” said Saleh Dabbakeh, the Damascus-based spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), referring to efforts to get into Baba Amro. He declined to say why Syrian forces had blocked their entry.

The ICRC said workers had instead delivered supplies to areas nearby where many people had taken refuge.

The United Nations’ refugee agency said up to 2,000 Syrians had fled the fighting for neighbouring Lebanon.

Refugees told of army shelling and gunfire in border towns.

Meanwhile, Syrian state television showed images of the corpses of anti-Assad fighters killed in clashes in the suburbs of the city of Hama, as well as an array of captured weapons, including arms it said were US and Israeli-made.