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| Syria state TV accuses foreign groups of biased reporting | |
| 2013-04-12 | |
Syria on Thursday accused foreign organisations of being biased in favour of opposition fighters, after Human Rights Watch (HRW) charged government forces with deliberately conducting airstrikes against civilians, DPA reported.
"These attacks are serious violations of international humanitarian law," it said. "People who commit such violations with criminal intent are responsible for war crimes." It added that its report was based on 140 interviews and visits to some 50 sites. "We have been saying and showing pictures of targeted bakeries, hospitals and whole neighbourhoods where there was no presence of the revolutionary fighters," said Samir al-Nashaar of the opposition Syrian National Coalition, adding the report was "a bit late." Local activists claim that more than 4,300 people have been killed in government airstrikes since July 2012, the HRW report said Without naming HRW, Syrian state television said foreign organizations rely only on accounts by opposition activists when reporting about the war in Syria. Syria's official news agency SANA said that Damascus had asked the United Nations Security Council to list the rebel al-Nusra Front as linked to al-Qaeda, a day after the group pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri. Syria has repeatedly blamed the two year-conflict on what it calls "terrorist gangs" allegedly financed by foreign powers. The opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that at least 55 people were killed by government troops and pro-regime militias in two separate attacks on Thursday. At least 45, including five children and seven women, were killed in the southern province of Daraa. The dead also included 16 insurgents killed in clashes with government troops. At least 10 civilians of the same family were reportedly killed by paramilitaries known as Shabiha in the central province of Homs, added the Britain-based observatory. Meanwhile, Syrian jets raided east Lebanon, wounding at least six people, Lebanese security sources said, the second such incident in one week. The attack took place on the outskirts of the Lebanese village of Arsal,a mainly Sunni Muslim village whose residents back Syrian rebels. Syria warned last month that its troops would fire into Lebanon if what it called "terrorist gangs" continued to infiltrate Syrian territories to fight alongside the rebels. | |
| Posted by:Steve White |