DAMASCUS – A Syria war monitor said Saturday that security forces killed 136 members of the Alawite minority, to which toppled president Bashar al-Assad belongs, a day after deadly clashes with gunmen loyal to him triggered a major security operation.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 231 people have been killed since the clashes erupted on Thursday along the country’s western coast. They were the fiercest attacks on Syria’s new rulers since Assad’s ouster, and followed other deadly incidents in the area earlier this week. Restoring security has been one of the most complex tasks for Syria’s new authorities, installed after Islamist-led forces ousted Assad in a lightning offensive in December.
Western powers and Syria’s neighbours have emphasised the need for unity in the new Syria, which is seeking funds for reconstructing a nation ravaged by years of war under Assad.
The Britain-based Observatory said the 136 dead civilians, including at least 13 women and five children, “were executed by security forces in the regions of Banyas, Latakia and Jableh.” The Observatory and activists released footage showing dozens of bodies in civilian clothing piled in the yard of a house, with blood stains nearby and women wailing. Other videos appeared to show men in military garb shooting people at close range. The United Nations envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, decried “very troubling reports of civilian casualties”.
He called on all sides to refrain from actions which could “destabilise Syria, and jeopardise a credible and inclusive political transition.”
An interior ministry source quoted by official news agency SANA said isolated incidents had occurred on the coast and pledged to put a stop to them. “After remnants of the toppled regime assassinated a number of security personnel, popular unorganised masses headed to the coast, which led to a number of individual violations,” the source said.
After Thursday’s clashes, which according to the Observatory left 78 dead — about half security force members and the other half gunmen, plus seven civilians — the authorities had launched a sweeping security operation. Mustafa Kneifati, a security official in Latakia, said that in “a well-planned and premeditated attack, several groups of Assad militia remnants attacked our positions and checkpoints, targeting many of our patrols” around the coastal town of Jableh.__The Nation
