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MOSCOW -- Russia's defiance of international efforts to end Syrian President Bashar Assad's crackdown on protests is rooted in a calculation that it can keep a Mideast presence by propping up its last remaining ally in the region and has nothing to lose if it fails.
The Kremlin has put itself in conflict with the West as it shields Assad's regime from United Nations sanctions and continues to provide it with weapons even as others impose arms embargoes.
But Moscow's relations with Washington are already strained amid controversy over U.S. missile defense plans and other disputes. And Prime Minister Vladimir Putin seems eager to defy the U.S. as he campaigns to reclaim the presidency in March elections.
"It would make no sense for Russia to drop its support for Assad," said Ruslan Pukhov, head of the independent Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies. "He is Russia's last remaining ally in the Middle East, allowing it to preserve some influence in the region."
Moscow may also hope that Assad can hang on to power with its help and repay Moscow with more weapons contracts and other lucrative deals.
And observers note that even as it has nothing to lose from backing Assad, it has nothing to gain from switching course and supporting the opposition.
"Russia has crossed the Rubicon," said Igor Korotchenko, head of the Center for Analysis of Global Weapons Trade.
He said Russia will always be marked as the patron of the Assad regime regardless of the conflict's outcome, so there's little incentive to build bridges with the protesters. The U.N. estimates that more than 5,400 people have been killed since the uprising began in March.
"Russia will be seen as the dictator's ally. If Assad's regime is driven from power, it will mean an end to Russia's presence," said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the magazine Russia in Global Affairs.
Syria has been Moscow's top ally in the Middle East since Soviet times, when it was led by the incumbent's father, Hafez Assad. The Kremlin saw it as a bulwark for countering U.S. influence in the region and heavily armed Syria against Israel.
While Russia's relations with Israel have improved greatly since the Soviet collapse, ties with Damascus helped Russia retain its clout as a member of the Quartet of international mediators trying to negotiate peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
After Bashar Assad succeeded his father in 2000, Russia sought to boost ties by agreeing to annul 73 percent of Syria's Soviet-era debt. In the mid-2000s, Putin said Russia would re-establish its place in the Mideast via "the Syria route."
Syria's port of Tartus is now the only naval base Russia has outside the former Soviet Union. A Russian navy squadron made a call there this month in what was seen by many as a show of support for Assad.
For decades, Syria has been a major customer for the Russian arms industries, buying billions of dollars' worth of combat jets, missiles, tanks and other heavy weapons. And unlike some other nations, such as Venezuela, which obtained Russian weapons on Kremlin loans, Assad's regime paid cash.
The respected newspaper Kommersant reported this week that Syria has ordered 36 Yak-130 combat jets worth $550 million. The deal, which officials wouldn't confirm or deny, may signal preparations for even bigger purchases of combat planes.
Korotchenko said Syria needs the jets to train its pilots to fly the advanced MiG-29M or MiG-35 fighter jets it wants to purchase: "It's a precursor of future deals."
Korotchenko said Syria's importance as a leading importer of Russian weapons in the region grew after the loss of the lucrative Iraqi and Libyan markets.
Russia, whose abstention in a U.N. vote cleared the way for military intervention in Libya, later voiced frustration with what it described as a disproportional use of force by NATO.
The Kremlin has vowed not to allow a replay of the Libyan strategy in Syria, warning that it would block any U.N. resolution on Syria lacking a clear ban on any foreign military interference.
Moscow accuses the West of turning a blind eye to shipments of weapons to the Syrian opposition and warns it won't be bound by Western sanctions.
Earlier this month, a Syria-bound Russian ship allegedly carrying tons of munitions was stopped by officials in Cyprus, an EU member, who said it was violating an EU arms embargo. The ship's captain promised to head to Turkey but then made a dash to Syria.
AMMAN, Jan 31 (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday he hoped the Security Council would reflect international will when it deliberates a draft resolution calling on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to quit power.
Spurred by Assad's brutal crackdown on anti-government protesters, the Arab League, backed by the United States, France and Britain, will ask the Council on Tuesday to adopt the resolution. Russia, one of Syria's few allies, has objected to it on the grounds it could pave the way for military intervention in Syria.
"I sincerely hope the Security Council will be united and speak in a coherent manner reflecting the wishes of the international community," he told reporters in the Jordanian capital. "This is crucially important."
China, which like Russia has a veto in the council, also has reservations about the draft. Russia and China vetoed a European-drafted resolution in October that condemned Syria and threatened it with sanctions.
"I don't think we can go on like this," Ban said.
Syria's crackdown on protesters and anti-government fighters had gone on despite a now-suspended Arab League monitoring mission and action was needed to stop the bloodshed, he said.
"Even with the monitoring missions having been there, more than a few hundred have been killed ... every day tens of people are killed ... this should stop immediately," Ban said. "It is crucially important for the Security Council to act on this."
They are trying to do more than that.
The muslim brotherhood is behind the protests is Syria like they were behind the protests in Egypt. The goal is to totally destablize the middle east and destroy Israel. Assad, as bad as he was intended to keep the peace, which meant no support for the arab palestinians. The muslim brotherhood intends to change that.
Brotherhood would cancel Camp David Agreement, says Hezbollah official
One by one, the current governments in the middle east will come under the control of terrorists, or be removed and replaced by one that will.
BEIRUT Syrian security forces fanned out in Hama on Thursday as protesters splashed red paint symbolizing blood in the streets to mark the 30th anniversary of a notorious massacre carried out by President Bashar Assad's father and predecessor.
The Hama massacre of 1982, which leveled entire neighborhoods and killed thousands of people, has become a rallying cry for the Syrian uprising that began nearly 11 months ago in the hopes of ending four decades of the Assad family rule.
Hundreds of troops and security forces were in Hama on Thursday, closing off public squares and setting up checkpoints.
"There is a checkpoint every 100 meters," said Ahmed Jimejmi, a Hama resident.
Activists painted two streets in Hama red to symbolize blood, and threw red dye in the waters of Hama's famous and ancient water wheels.
Graffiti on the walls read: "Hafez died, and Hama didn't. Bashar will die, and Hama won't."
Assad's father, Hafez, ordered the scorched-earth assault on Hama 30 years ago to put down an uprising against his rule. Amnesty International has claimed that 10,000-25,000 were killed, though conflicting figures exist and the Syrian government has never made an official estimate.
For the next two decades, until his death, Hafez Assad ruled uncontested and the massacre was seared into the minds of Syrians.
Now, as the country faces a far larger revolt against Bashar Assad, the U.N. estimates more than 5,400 people have been killed in the government crackdown.
Also Thursday, a top defense official said Russia will not stop selling arms to Syria as Moscow stands by its longtime ally despite mounting international condemnation over the Syrian regime's bloody crackdown.
Russia's Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov said his country is not violating any international obligations by selling weapons to Damascus.
"As of today there are no restrictions on our delivery of weapons," he told journalists in Russia, according to the country's state news agencies. "We must fulfill our obligations and this is what we are doing."
Moscow has been one of Syria's most powerful allies along with Iran as Syria tries to crush the revolt against President Bashar Assad.
Moscow's stance is motivated in part by its strategic and defense ties, including weapons sales, with Syria. But Russia also rejects what it sees as a a world order dominated by the U.S. Last month, Russia reportedly signed a $550-million deal to sell combat jets to Syria.
U.N. ambassadors this week are trying to overcome Russia's opposition to a draft resolution at the Security Council calling for Assad to surrender power. Moscow says it would veto the draft because it believes it opens the way for eventual international military action.
BEIRUT Syrian forces have detained and tortured children as young as 13 as President Bashar Assad's regime tries to crush a nearly 11-month-old uprising, Human Rights Watch said Friday, as fresh clashes erupted between regime troops and rebels in the country's south.
Friday's fighting in Jassem, in the southern province of Daraa, killed at least one soldier and wounded five, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. In the north, a roadside bomb killed two boys in the province of Idlib, state media and activists said.
The Syrian conflict has grown more militarized in recent months as army defectors have joined the uprising against Assad and formed a guerrilla force. The armed resistance has in turn provoked a heavier regime assault on areas where the defectors are fighting.
The United Nations estimated in January that at least 5,400 people have been killed in the crackdown, including soldiers who defected and those who refused orders to fire on civilians. But the U.N. has been unable to update its tally since because the chaos in the country has made it difficult to cross-check the latest figures.
On Friday, Human Rights Watch said in a new report that it has documented at least 12 cases of children detained under "inhumane" conditions and tortured, as well as children shot in their homes or on the street.
"Children have not been spared the horror of Syria's crackdown," said Lois Whitman, children's rights director at the New York-based group. "Syrian security forces have killed, arrested, and tortured children in their homes, their schools, or on the streets. In many cases, security forces have targeted children just as they have targeted adults."
The report quoted a 16-year-old boy from the town of Tal Kalakh near the Lebanese border as saying he was detained for eight months during which he was held in seven different detention centers, as well as the Homs Central Prison.
The boy, whom HRW referred to as Alaa, said security forces first asked him how many protests he participated in, and then cuffed his left hand to the ceiling and left him hanging there for about seven hours, standing on his toes.
"They beat me for about two hours with cables and shocked me with cattle prods. Then they threw water on the ground and poured water on me from above," he said.
In another case, the parents of a 13-year-old boy from the coastal city of Latakia told HRW that in December security officers arrested him and held him for nine days. According to his parents, he was accused of burning photos of Assad, vandalizing security forces' cars and inciting other children to protest.
Security officers burned him with cigarettes on his neck and hands, the parents said, and threw boiling water on his body.
An adult former detainee told the rights group that some children were raped while in detention.
Also Friday, activists reported protests across Syria, including in the central provinces of Hama and Homs, the northern region of Idlib, in towns and villages in the south as well as areas around the capital, Damascus.
The Observatory said more than 20,000 people marched in the streets of the southern villages of Dael and Nawa where security forces opened fire to disperse the crowds. The report could not be independently confirmed.
BEIRUT, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Syrian forces bombarded Homs on Monday, killing 50 people in a sustained assault on several districts of the city which has become a centre of armed opposition to President Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian National Council opposition group said.
The bombardment came a day after the United States promised harsher sanctions against Damascus in response to Russian and Chinese vetoes of a draft U.N. resolution that would have backed an Arab plan urging Assad to step aside.
"The tally that we have received from various activists in Homs since the shelling started at six this morning is 50, mostly civilians," Catherine al-Talli of the Syrian National Council told Reuters.
The opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had the names of 17 people killed so far, adding it expected the death toll to rise. Arab satellite television channels broadcast live footage showing smoke rising from buildings, with explosions echoing in the background.
"This is the most violent bombardment in recent days," said one activist in Syria who was in touch with Homs residents. Another activist said forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad were using multiple rocket launchers in the attack.
Activists said more than 200 people were killed on Friday night when tanks and artillery blasted the Khalidiya neighbourhood of Homs. It was the highest reported death toll in a single day since the uprising against Assad's rule, inspired by uprisings across the Arab world, erupted last March.
Damascus denies firing on houses and says images of dead bodies on the Internet were staged. State media said on Monday "armed terrorist groups" were firing mortars in the city, setting fire to tyres and blowing up empty buildings to give the impression that Homs was under fire from Assad's forces.
Reports from activists and authorities are hard to verify because Syria restricts access for independent media.
The latest assault appeared to be widely targeted, with explosions in Khalidiya, Baba Amro, Bayada and Bab Dreib neighbourhoods, the activists said.
"They want to drive the Free Syrian Army out," said Baba Amro resident Hussein Nader by telephone, referring to the rebel force of army deserters and gunmen who have controlled parts of the city for months.
"Rockets are falling seconds apart on the same target."
Activists said an explosion ripped through an oil pipeline feeding a main refinery in Homs, the second attack on the pipeline in a week, and said the opposition-held town of Zabadani, near the Lebanese border, came under fire on Monday.
Syrian army defectors announced they were organising a new "Higher Revolutionary Council" to supersede the Free Syrian Army (FSA) as the main armed force battling Assad's rule. The new body would be commanded by General Ahmed al-Sheikh, the highest-ranking officer to defect to Turkey from government forces.
Syria Children Tortured By Security Forces, Report Says
BEIRUT Syrian forces have detained and tortured children as young as 13 as President Bashar Assad's regime tries to crush a nearly 11-month-old uprising, Human Rights Watch said Friday, as fresh clashes erupted between regime troops and rebels in the country's south.
Friday's fighting in Jassem, in the southern province of Daraa, killed at least one soldier and wounded five, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. In the north, a roadside bomb killed two boys in the province of Idlib, state media and activists said.
The Syrian conflict has grown more militarized in recent months as army defectors have joined the uprising against Assad and formed a guerrilla force. The armed resistance has in turn provoked a heavier regime assault on areas where the defectors are fighting.
The United Nations estimated in January that at least 5,400 people have been killed in the crackdown, including soldiers who defected and those who refused orders to fire on civilians. But the U.N. has been unable to update its tally since because the chaos in the country has made it difficult to cross-check the latest figures.
On Friday, Human Rights Watch said in a new report that it has documented at least 12 cases of children detained under "inhumane" conditions and tortured, as well as children shot in their homes or on the street.
"Children have not been spared the horror of Syria's crackdown," said Lois Whitman, children's rights director at the New York-based group. "Syrian security forces have killed, arrested, and tortured children in their homes, their schools, or on the streets. In many cases, security forces have targeted children just as they have targeted adults."
The report quoted a 16-year-old boy from the town of Tal Kalakh near the Lebanese border as saying he was detained for eight months during which he was held in seven different detention centers, as well as the Homs Central Prison.
The boy, whom HRW referred to as Alaa, said security forces first asked him how many protests he participated in, and then cuffed his left hand to the ceiling and left him hanging there for about seven hours, standing on his toes.
"They beat me for about two hours with cables and shocked me with cattle prods. Then they threw water on the ground and poured water on me from above," he said.
In another case, the parents of a 13-year-old boy from the coastal city of Latakia told HRW that in December security officers arrested him and held him for nine days. According to his parents, he was accused of burning photos of Assad, vandalizing security forces' cars and inciting other children to protest.
Security officers burned him with cigarettes on his neck and hands, the parents said, and threw boiling water on his body.
An adult former detainee told the rights group that some children were raped while in detention.
Also Friday, activists reported protests across Syria, including in the central provinces of Hama and Homs, the northern region of Idlib, in towns and villages in the south as well as areas around the capital, Damascus.
The Observatory said more than 20,000 people marched in the streets of the southern villages of Dael and Nawa where security forces opened fire to disperse the crowds. The report could not be independently confirmed.
Syria Children Tortured By Security Forces, Report Says
CNN reports that the United States has closed its embassy in Syria and withdrawn its staff.
ABC News confirms that U.S. embassy officials have left the country amid increasing violence.
"We have serious concerns about the deteriorating security situation in Damascus," the State Department said in a written statement last month, according to Reuters.
U.S. Ambassador Robert Ford left Syria in October following threats to his safety, however he returned to the country in December.
According to CNN, 17 embassy officials, including Ambassador Ford, left the country Monday morning. Most reportedly traveled by convoy to neighboring Jordan.
Last week, the UN Security Council failed to approve a resolution condemning Bashar al-Assad's regime crackdown after Russia and China cast vetoes.
Grav,what's the point or authority of the UN if Russia,China or the US for that matter can veto whenever it suits them,even if everyone else there wants the opposite?????????Totally Pointless Organisation or United Nothingness.stavrosU.S. Embassy In Syria Closed: Reports
CNN reports that the United States has closed its embassy in Syria and withdrawn its staff.
ABC News confirms that U.S. embassy officials have left the country amid increasing violence.
"We have serious concerns about the deteriorating security situation in Damascus," the State Department said in a written statement last month, according to Reuters.
U.S. Ambassador Robert Ford left Syria in October following threats to his safety, however he returned to the country in December.
According to CNN, 17 embassy officials, including Ambassador Ford, left the country Monday morning. Most reportedly traveled by convoy to neighboring Jordan.
Last week, the UN Security Council failed to approve a resolution condemning Bashar al-Assad's regime crackdown after Russia and China cast vetoes.
U.S. Embassy In Syria Closed: Reports
Grav,what's the point or authority of the UN if Russia,China or the US for that matter can veto whenever it suits them,even if everyone else there wants the opposite?????????Totally Pointless Organisation or United Nothingness.stavrosU.S. Embassy In Syria Closed: Reports
CNN reports that the United States has closed its embassy in Syria and withdrawn its staff.
ABC News confirms that U.S. embassy officials have left the country amid increasing violence.
"We have serious concerns about the deteriorating security situation in Damascus," the State Department said in a written statement last month, according to Reuters.
U.S. Ambassador Robert Ford left Syria in October following threats to his safety, however he returned to the country in December.
According to CNN, 17 embassy officials, including Ambassador Ford, left the country Monday morning. Most reportedly traveled by convoy to neighboring Jordan.
Last week, the UN Security Council failed to approve a resolution condemning Bashar al-Assad's regime crackdown after Russia and China cast vetoes.
U.S. Embassy In Syria Closed: Reports
Time to air drop about 100,000 guns, rocket lauchers, ect into syria for the free syrian army. Let them beat the thug!
BEIRUT Syrian forces renewed their assault on the flashpoint city of Homs Tuesday as Russia's foreign minister stressed the need for reform and dialogue during talks in Damascus with President Bashar Assad about the country's escalating violence.
Sergey Lavrov's visit comes days after Syrian allies Russia and China vetoed a Western- and Arab-backed resolution at the United Nations that would have condemned the Assad regime's crackdown on dissent and calling on him to transfer some of his powers to his deputy. The Syrian government had rejected the Arab plan as intervention in Syria's internal affairs.
Thousands of Syrians cheered Russia's foreign minister Tuesday as he arrived in Damascus.
"Necessary reforms must be implemented in order to address legitimate demands of the people striving for a better life," Lavrov later told Assad, according to Russian state-run news agency ITAR-Tass."
Lavrov also said Assad is ready for dialogue with the opposition.
"It's clear that efforts to stop the violence should be accompanied by the beginning of dialogue among the political forces," he said. "Today we received confirmation of the readiness of the president of Syria for this work."
Repeated efforts by the Arab League and Russia to broker talks have been rejected by the Syrian opposition, which refuses to hold talks amid the crackdown and says it will accept nothing less than the regime's downfall.
The violence, meanwhile, continued with regime forces keeping up an assault on Homs, Syria's third largest city. Activists reported that at least 15 people, including a 15-year-old boy, were killed in violence across the country.
More than 5,400 people have been killed in Syria since the uprising began in March, the U.N. said early last month. Hundreds more are believe to have been killed since then, but the U.N. says the chaos in the country has made it impossible to cross-check the figures.
Syria has blocked access to trouble spots and prevented independent reporting, making it nearly impossible to verify accounts from either side. The Assad regime says terrorists acting out a foreign conspiracy to destabilize the country are behind the uprising, not people seeking to transform the authoritarian regime.
Diplomatic efforts to end the bloodshed suffered a setback over the weekend when efforts by the U.S. and its allies in the U.N. Security Council to condemn the violence in Syria were blocked by Russia and China.
A series of European countries, including France and Italy, announced they had recalled their ambassadors to Syria, a day after the U.S. closed its embassy in Damascus. The diplomatic moves were a clear message that Western powers see no point in engaging with Assad and now will seek to bolster Syria's opposition.
Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also called the Security Council veto a "fiasco" and said his country cannot remain silent about the massacres in Syria and will continue to support the Arab League efforts.
"We will launch a new initiative with countries that stand by the Syrian people instead of the regime," Erdogan said without elaborating.
It was not clear what kind of steps Turkey might be planning. But Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has called for "friends of democratic Syria" to unite and rally against Assad's regime, previewing the possible formation of a group of like-minded nations to coordinate assistance to the Syrian opposition from outside the U.N.
The central city of Homs was the site of the deadliest assault of the uprising on Saturday, when more than 200 people were killed in an overnight bombardment hours before the U.N. vote.
An activist said tanks were closing in on the rebel-held Baba Amr district in Homs, tightening a months-long siege of the area.
"The shelling has been going on for days and the siege is getting worse. We are short of everything including food and medical supplies," said an activist who identified himself only by his first name, Omar. "People here have not slept for days."
The British-based Observatory for Human Rights said troops were attempting to storm the Baba Amr, Khaldiyeh and Bayada districts and said at least nine civilians were killed in the shelling. It also reported that a 15-year-old boy was shot to death by security forces who stormed the town of Houleh, in Homs province.
Time to air drop about 100,000 guns, rocket lauchers, ect into syria for the free syrian army. Let them beat the thug!
I agree.
Time to air drop about 100,000 guns, rocket lauchers, ect into syria for the free syrian army. Let them beat the thug!
I agree.
How did that work out in Libya? Or Egypt for that matter!
Is it to our benefit to support the muslim brotherhood and the taliban in their take over of these independent middle eastern nations? I can understand the need to get rid of a thug ruler, Lord knows we have one right here, right now. What I can't understand is replacing a thug ruler with a worse thug to be ruler.
Now that the "free" Egyptians, and yes I mean that sarcastically, has told the state department that they not only won't negotiate for the release of the Americans held, they won't even meet with our state department at all. It might be worth pointing out that those who were arrested are from NGO organizations who went to Egypt to help the newly freed Egyptians form a democracy. What would happen if the son of obama's transportation secretary is tried and found guilty of anti government agitation and publicly beheaded for You Tube? It might take that to hammer through the density of the president's head that he's been wrong all along. The president is proving himself a "black hole" in its truest sense. A mass so dense that light cannot escape.
It's worked SO WELL, Surely we need to do it again in Syria.
Only the Russians and the Chinese have it right.
