Syria

"A video grab taken from footage uploaded to YouTube." (Agence France-Presse)

Syria: Mass Grave Found in Dera'a
The Telegraph, May 16, 2011
"Syria's brutal crackdown against pro-democracy protests took a chilling turn on Monday with the discovery of a mass grave in Dera'a, the town at the heart of two-month-long protests, an activist said. 'The army today allowed residents to venture outside their homes for two hours daily,' said Ammar Qurabi of the National Organisation for Human Rights in Syria.'They discovered a mass grave in the old part of town but authorities immediately cordoned off the area to prevent residents from recovering the bodies, some of which they promised would be handed over later,' he said on the phone from Cairo. Qurabi said the Syrian regime must bear full responsibility for the crimes committed against 'unarmed' citizens and urged the international community and civil society to pressure it to stop the 'brutal repression' of its people. He was unable say how many people were buried in the alleged mass grave. His account could not be independently verified as Syrian authorities have all but sealed off the country to foreign journalists amid a brutal crackdown against unprecedented protests threatening the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. Qurabi said that 34 people had also been killed in the past five days in the towns of Jassem and Inkhil, near Dera'a. 'I fear that dozens more casualties may be lying in nearby wheat fields and orchards because families have not been able to access the region which is encircled by security troops and snipers,' he said. The unrest in Syria first erupted in Damascus on March 15 but was promptly put down and soon spread to Dera'a and across the country with protesters emboldened by the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt. More than 850 people, including women and children, have been killed and at least 8,000 arrested as security forces crack down on the protest movements, according to rights groups.
The bloodshed spilled into neighbouring Lebanon at the weekend when a Syrian woman, among dozens fleeing the northwestern town of Tall Kalakh, was killed and six other people wounded, a Lebanese security official said. Witnesses contacted by telephone also reported 10 people were killed on Sunday in Tall Kalakh, located near the Lebanese border, as security forces deployed inside the town. Shelling and shooting was also reported in the nearby town of Arida, an activist told AFP. Meanwhile hundreds of protesters and rights advocates detained in recent days were released on Sunday after signing pledges not to take part in further protests, said Rami Abdul-Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. 'Several of them said they had been tortured,' he said, adding that thousands of people remained jailed and more arrests were taking place. The regime has blamed the deadly violence on 'armed terrorist gangs' backed by Islamists and foreign agitators. [...]"