Syrian Observatory: Army Recaptures Homs' Baba Amr
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
Forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar Assad have seized Baba Amr in the central city of Homs, a watchdog said on Tuesday, two weeks after fighting for the flashpoint district erupted.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights issued the report a day after it said opposition activists had found the scorched corpses of 13 people, including five women and four children, in the village of Abel in the countryside near Homs.
"Syrian regime forces have recaptured total control of the district of Baba Amr, after more than two weeks, after rebel fighters had infiltrated the area and seized several neighborhoods," said the Britain-based group.
An activist from the district confirmed the report, saying: "The rebels have withdrawn from Baba Amr.”
The rebel fighters had re-entered Baba Amr after the army launched an all-out assault aimed at crushing the insurgency in besieged insurgent enclaves of central Homs.
This time last year, regime forces overran Baba Amr after a relentless month-long siege that left the neighborhood in ruins and claimed hundreds of lives.
In recent days, "the army used warplanes, rockets and tank shells to bombard" Baba Amr, said the Observatory, adding residents who had fled their homes in the district returned to find them "uninhabitable.”
On Monday night, the Observatory said at least 13 scorched bodies were found in the village of Abel, in the countryside near Homs.
The victims had been "slaughtered and burned,” said the Observatory, adding that "activists blamed pro-regime militia for committing this massacre".
The Syrian Revolution General Commission, a network of activists on the ground, distributed on Tuesday amateur video showing a row of buildings reduced to piles of grey rubble in a neighborhood of Homs city.
"This is total destruction... residential buildings have been destroyed... shops have been destroyed... everything inside the buildings has been destroyed," an unidentified activist can be heard saying in the video.
"Homs is burning and no one cares."
26 March 2013, 10:35
22
start the negotiations already and save syria. the obstinance of revolutionary "leaders" is claiming lives in return for political clout by extending the bloodshed. do what you profess and save the syrian people.
26 March 2013, 11:16
25
Mowaten, the Assad regime mowed them down when they were demonstrating unarmed. This led to a shift from "silmya" to "mousallaha". I think that we need to remember this.
But I do agree with joker37: the opposition controls a lot of territory and has powerful backing. It is now in a position to negotiate and try to achieve through negotiations what it set up to achieve at the onset of the revolution.
26 March 2013, 12:00
04
Mowaten would you please provide a reference where the opposition agrees that there was Al-Quaeda infiltration from the onset of the uprising. I'm googling without any success.
FT: I tend to believe the "mowing down thingy". I rely on countless reports from the field by countless reputable new agencies (they are reputable to me and I fully accept that you distrust them). Arwa Damon's reporting from the field comes to mind, among several others. Besides, there is precedence: Bashar's father sure mowed our civilians down with his réjmét and heavy artillery. I have no reason to doubt that the same system that did this to us would hesitate to do it against the population in opposition-controlled areas in Syria.
26 March 2013, 12:14
04
And FT: At least superficially , Assad still has substantial support internally. I say "superficially" because there were a lot people cheering for Kaddafi and Saddam until the very last minute and look what happened. Assad still controls better equipped, trained and organized fighting forces. This is the reason he is still around. But I think that we both agree that he lost control of very large areas of Syria and that his influence in the ME and the elsewhere in world has diminished dramatically. Even the Russians are no longer staunch allies and it seems that the Iranians are hedging their bets. I don't think that he is going to make it out of this.
26 March 2013, 12:32
03
Mowaten, sure, I agree that Al-Quaeda and Al Nusra are key elements of the opposition, but I argue that it did not have to be that way. Had the Assad regime not succumbed to its repressive instinct, the outcome would have become quite different. Please note that there are several reports of the population revolting against the Islamists in opposition-controlled area. The frictions between the Islamists and the FSA are increasing. The Islamists and the FSA have a common enemy today, but once that enemy is gone, the FSA will fight to throw the Islamists out. The FSA will come out on top, I'm sure about this.
26 March 2013, 13:00
04
That's the only sensible thing to do FT. We need a peaceful, inclusive and stable Syria next door.
26 March 2013, 15:44
02
Qaddafi was about to wipe out Benghazi within weeks if it wasnt for foreign intervention. Do not question the opposition not winning as support for Bashar.. but more like Bashar, with ALL his weapons (which i think we can all agree are much more powerful than the oppositions) has not been able to suppress the opposition.. kinda makes you wonder who is really with him if he has problems fighting on various fronts.. revolutions last a long time .. 2 years is not much... but i think ( and no offence meant) that it is silly to say that it is obvious people are still with Bashar because they havent been able to topple him.. while in fact the exact opposite is true.
26 March 2013, 11:14
32
FSA can and will only take what the President of Syria Bashar Hafez Al Assad gives them. To think or believe anything else is laughable!
26 March 2013, 12:47
24
Assad days are numbered to think otherwise is wishful thinking ,too much blood had been spilled for it to end with Assad still in power .
