Video: gun-fire erupts as residents plead with monitors

Footage has been released which purportedly shows Syrian residents pleading with Arab League monitors to come further inside their district.

Blasts of gunfire erupted in the video that activists say was shot in the city of Homs were fighting between government troops and protesters has been fierce.

The residents, reported to be from the district of Baba Amr, are seen to plead with one of the monitors urging him to repeat his concerns about gunshots in the area on camera.

“You were telling the head of the mission that you cannot cross to the second street because of the gunfire. Why don’t you say it (to us)?” one man shouted, grabbing the monitor by his jacket. The monitor said only the head of the team could make a public statement.

The video showed at least two monitors and two men wearing orange vests surrounded by a crowd of residents from Baba Amr.

The district has been hit by machine gun fire and mortar rounds in recent days in apparent clashes between armed rebels and the army, which was video taped firing into the area from tanks.

Other residents surrounding the team begged the monitors to enter their neighbourhoods.

“Come and see, they are slaughtering us I swear,” a man yelled.