Syria opposition urges UN, Arab intervention

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Syria opposition urges UN, Arab intervention

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Syria opposition urged UN and Arab League intervention as security forces killed 23 people in Homs.

27 December,2011 07:28 am

Syrias opposition on Monday urged United Nations and Arab League intervention as gunfire from security forces killed 23 people in the besieged central city of Homs.Syrian National Council (SNC) head Burhan Ghaliun told reporters at a Paris news conference that some of the observers were in the besieged city but they are saying they cannot go where the authorities do not want them to go.He sought UN and Arab League intervention to put an end to this tragedy, and urged the UN Security Council to adopt the Arab Leagues plan and ensure that it is applied.It is better if the UN Security Council takes this (Arab League) plan, adopts and provides the means for its application, Ghaliun said. That would give it more force.The Arab plan to defuse the crisis is a good plan, but I do not believe the Arab League really has the means to enforce it.The mission is part of an Arab plan endorsed by Syria on November 2 that calls for the withdrawal of the military from towns and residential districts, a halt to violence against civilians and the release of detainees.Since signing the agreement, Assads regime has been accused of intensifying its crackdown.An initial group of 50 observers was to have landed in Syria on Monday to oversee the deal aimed at ending a bloody crackdown on anti-regime dissent, which has showed no signs of abating since it erupted in March.Earlier, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said rocket fire and heavy machineguns in the Baba Amro quarter killed 15 people and wounded dozens.Seven civilians died in other parts of the central Syrian city and its suburbs, and a woman was killed at Talbisseh near Homs.Another three people, including a 14-year-old boy, were shot dead by security forces at a demonstration in Khattab in neighbouring Hama province, and a youth was shot dead in Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.In other developments, four army deserters died in clashes with loyalist troops near the Turkish border village of Al-Yunsieh, and explosions were heard amid fighting between deserters and soldiers in the Damascus suburb of Douma.