Epress.am News from Armenia
Security forces have arrested some 500 pro-democracy sympathizers across Syria after the government sent in tanks to try to crush protests in the city of Deraa, the Syrian rights organization Sawasiah said on Tuesday, Reuters reports.
The independent organization said it had received reports that at least 20 people had been killed in Deraa since tanks moved in on Monday, but communications with the southern town where the protests against President Bashar al-Assad began on Mar. 18 had been cut making it hard to confirm the information.
“Witnesses managed to tell us that at least 20 civilians have been killed in Deraa, but we do not have their names and we cannot verify,” said a Sawasiah official, adding that two civilians were confirmed dead in the Damascus suburb of Douma, which forces entered earlier in the day.
At least 500 were arrested elsewhere in Syria, it said.
Amnesty international, citing sources in Deraa, said at least 23 people were killed when tanks shelled Deraa in what it called “a brutal reaction to people’s demands.”
“By resorting to the use of artillery against its own people today, the Syrian government has shown its determination to crush the peaceful protests at virtually any cost, whatever the price in Syrians’ lives,” said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Director.
Security forces and the gunmen loyal to Assad have killed more than 350 civilians across Syria since pro-democracy protests broke out in Deraa, rights groups say. A third of the victims were shot in the past four days as the scale and breadth of a popular revolt against Assad grew.