Syrian opposition test fragile truce with protest

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Syrian opposition test fragile truce with protest

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Syrian forces halted fight in line with the truce that began at dawn on Thursday.

13 April,2012 11:43 am

Syrias opposition has called for widespread protests on Friday to test the regimes commitment to an internationally brokered cease-fire that the U.N. chief described as so fragile it could collapse with a single gunshot.Regime forces halted heavy shelling and other major attacks in line with the truce that began at dawn Thursday, though there were accusations of scattered violence by both sides. The government ignored demands to pull troops back to barracks, however, defying a key aspect of the plan, which aims to calm a year-old uprising that has killed 9,000 people and has pushed the country toward civil war.The onus is on the government of Syria to prove that their words will be matched by their deeds at this time, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told reporters in Geneva. He said the world was watching with skeptical eyes.This cease-fire process is very fragile. It may be broken any time, Ban added, saying another gunshot could doom the truce.The test will come when we start to see protests across the length and breadth of the country, said Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center. Is the Assad regime willing to accept that there will likely be hundreds of thousands of people on the streets in the next few days? And will they accept those protesters, if they are not breaking any laws, occupying certain spaces and towns and centers of towns, should that start to arise?An outbreak of violence at a chaotic rally could give the regime a pretext for ending the truce. And it would be difficult to determine the source of such an attack, given that Syria is largely sealed off from journalists and outside observers.The U.N. chiefs envoy, Kofi Annan, urged the 15-nation U.N. Security Council to authorize an observer mission that would keep the cease-fire going and to demand that Assad order his troops back to barracks, U.N. diplomats said. The council could adopt a resolution on the observers as early as Friday, the diplomats said on condition of anonymity because the meeting was closed.Western powers, skeptical that Assad will call off the killings, said an end to violence is just the first step.