Syrian army shells rebels
Violence continues as Red Cross delivers aid to refugees near Baba Amr
DAMASCUS: Syrian artillery gunners pounded the mainly rebel-held city of Rastan, monitors said, as the Red Cross began delivering aid to refugees from the battered Baba Amr district of nearby Homs.
The aid distribution came as relief agencies waited for a third straight day for the go-ahead to enter Baba Amr, where hundreds of people are reported to have been killed and even more wounded in an almost monthlong shelling blitz.
The shelling of Rastan, which the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said killed at least three civilians including a woman, coincided with a call by China on all parties in Syria to “unconditionally” end the violence.
“Since dawn, the positions of deserters in the north of Rastan have been subject to intensive shelling,” Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based Observatory, said.
The rebel fighters on Feb 5 declared Rastan to be “liberated” from President Bashar al-assad’s control, but since Homs was overrun by regime forces on thursday, the desert-ers have been bracing for an onslaught on Rastan and on Qusayr, also near Homs.
Rastan is a strategic city as, like Homs, it falls on the main road linking Damascus with northern Syria.
The Observatory had on Friday reported 12 civilians, including five children, killed when a rocket
We have started to distribute humanitarian aid in Abel village, three kilometres from Baba Amr. — SALEH DABBAKEH
slammed into a crowd off protesters iin Rastan.
The Observatory’s reports were not immediately verified due to restrictions on foreign journalists in Syria.
The rebels fled the Baba Amr section of Homs on Thursday in the face of a ground assault by regime forces following a shelling blitz since early February that the Us-based Human Rights Watch said had killed some 700 people.
HRW said shells sometimes fell in Baba Amr at a rate of 100 an hour and that satellite images showed 640 buildings visibly damaged, but stressed that the real picture could be worse.
The Syrian authorities have been condemned by the international community for barring Red Cross convoys from entering Baba Amr to evacuate the wounded and deliver relief supplies.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it delivered relief supplies yesterday to refugees from Baba Amr in a nearby village of central Syria.
“We have started to distribute humanitarian aid in Abel village, three kilometres from Baba Amr,” ICRC spokesman Saleh Dabbakeh said.
“Many refugees from Baba Amr are iin Abel,” he said, adding that they were being supplied with food products and blankets.
Dabbakeh said a similar operation would take place in Inshaat, another district of Homs, while the ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent Society awaited the go-ahead from authorities to enter Baba Amr itself.
A seven-truck convoy organised by the aid groups has been waiting since Friday to enter Baba Amr, with the authorities saying they were being barred for their own safety because of the presence of bombs and landmines.
Meanwhile, China, which twice joined Russia in blocking UN Security Council resolutions against Syria’s lethal crackdown on dissent, urged an end to the violence.
Xinhua news agency cited a foreign ministry statement attributed to an unnamed official calling for dialogue between the Syrian regime and those expressing “political aspirations”.
But the official reportedly added: “We oppose anyone interfering in Syria’s internal affairs under the pretext of ‘humanitarian issues’.”