SYRIA RISING
28 reported killed in Aleppo bombings, opposition denies role
More deaths, explosions raise fears of civil war,
AMMAN— Two explosions struck security compounds in Aleppo on Friday, killing 28 people, state media reported, the first significant violence in a major city that has largely stood by Syrian President Bashar Assad in the 11-month-old uprising against his rule.
The blasts come as escalating violence between regime forces and an increasingly militarized opposition has raised fears the conflict is spiraling toward civil war.
Asyrian offensive aimed at crushing rebels in the battered city of Homs continued Friday, with soldiers who have been bombarding the city for the past six days making their first ground move to seize one of the most restive neighbourhoods.
State TV blamed “terrorists” for the blasts in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, and said they were proof the government is facing a violent enemy. Anti-assad activists accused the regime of setting off Friday’s blasts to discredit the opposition and avert protests that had been planned in the northern city Friday.
Capt. Ammar al-wawi of the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group that wants to bring down the regime by force, denied involvement.
“This explosion is the work of the regime to divert world attention from the crimes it is committing against the people of Homs,” he said.
Along with the capital Damascus, Aleppo is Syria’s economic centre, home to the business community and prosperous merchant classes whose continued backing for Assad has been crucial in bolstering his regime. The city has seen only occasional protests.
Three bombings in Damascus in December and January that killed dozens prompted similar exchanges of accusations. Nobody has claimed responsibility for those attacks.
Outside one of the compounds hit, the Military Intelligence Director- ate, a weeping correspondent on state-run TV showed graphic footage of at least five corpses, collected in sacks and under blankets. Debris filled the street and residential buildings appeared to have their windows shattered. But the location did not appear to be closed off, and few uniformed police were around. There was no immediate sign of wounded. Earth-moving equipment was seen clearing the rubble. The TV presenter said the blast went off near a park and claimed children were among the dead, although none were seen in the tele-
“This explosion is the work of the regime to divert world attention.” CAPT. AMMAR AL-WAWI OF THE FREE SYRIAN ARMY
vision footage. The second blast went off outside the headquarters of a police force in another part of the city. State television cited the Health Ministry as saying 25 people were killed in the two blasts and 175 were wounded. Mohammed Abu-nasr, an Aleppo-based activist, said the blasts came on a day when activists were planning wide protests in the city after the Friday prayers. He said several hundred people showed up for the protests despite the bombings in different parts of the city.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordinating Committees activist group said security forces opened fire on protesters, killing at least seven people. The figures were impossible to confirm.
So far, Assad’s opponents have had little success in Aleppo, in part because the business leaders have long traded political freedoms for economic privileges.
The city of around two million also has a large population of Kurds, who have mostly stayed on the sidelines of the uprising since Assad’s regime began giving them citizenship, which had long been denied.
Assad’s forces have killed more than 5,400 people since the uprising began in March.
The regime’s crushing of dissent has left it almost completely isolated internationally. But Assad has political backing from Russia and China, which delivered a double veto over the weekend that blocked a UN resolution calling on him to leave power.
Hundreds of people are believed to have been killed in the past week in Homs from relentless shelling. On Friday, soldiers backed by tanks pushed into the neighbourhood of Inshaat. The Observatory said troops were going house to house detaining people. Inshaat is next to Baba Amr, a neighbourhood under rebel control for months. Activists said at least four people were killed Friday in shelling in Baba Amr.