Assad rejects Arab League resolutions as hostile act

A funeral in Syria Cairo / Damascus – Akram Ali The Syrian representative Bashar Jaafar, told the general assembly about recent bomb attacks in Syria which he blamed on Al-Qaida, The Guardian liveblogging reported. Jaafar also said that "armed groups" were assassinating people.Syria, the representative said, has suffered thousands of innocent victims as the price of defending its internal security. "The state has exclusive responsibility for defending security in its national territory."
Meanwhile, UN human rights chief Navi Pillay, addressing the general assembly, said the failure of the security council resolution on Syria "appears to have emboldened the Syrian government," it is reported on The Guardian website.
Crimes against humanity are "likely" to have been committed, she said, and hospitals have been used as detention and torture facilities.
There have been "gross, widespread and systematic human rights violations" and the Syrian government has "manifestly failed to protect its population," she continued.
Pillay added that her office is ready to provide "appropriate assistance" if requested by the Arab League.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe warned Monday that any foreign military action in Syria would only aggravate the situation after the Arab League proposed sending in UN-Arab peacekeepers.
"We think that today any external intervention of a military nature would only worsen the situation, all the more given that there will not be a decision by the Security Council, which is the only body able to authorise military intervention," Juppe said in the southwestern city of Bordeaux.
Meanwhile, Britain said it will not provide troops for a peacekeeping mission in Syria, foreign office minister Alistair Burt has told the BBC."We believe that the forces that are deployed should not be Western and we would look to Arab League and other countries to make up a peacekeeping force," he said on Radio 4's The World At One, The Guardian reported.
Burt added that the UK wanted to provide practical support to people documenting human rights abuses in Syria: "We want to make sure that those documenting these events have the right equipment to do so, so that those who are perpetrating violence know they are being monitored and will be brought to justice."
Russia said on Monday that a ceasefire needed to be established in Syria before a joint UN-Arab peacekeeping mission could be deployed, according to The Daily Telegraph's liveblogging.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia was studying a new Arab League initiative for the body to form a joint peacekeeping force with the United Nations, adding that Moscow had questions about certain points.
"We are studying this initiative and expect our friends from the Arab states to provide us with a clarification of certain points," Lavrov said after talks with his United Arab Emirates counterpart Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahayan.
"In order to deploy a peacekeeping mission, you need the agreement of the receiving side," Lavrov said.
"In other words, you need to agree something resembling a ceasefire. But the problem is that the armed groups that are fighting the Syrian regime do not answer to anyone and are not controlled by anyone."
In the meantime, the European Union has welcomed the proposal of a joint Arab/UN peacekeeping force as a means of easing the violence in Syria, The Guaridan liveblogging reported.
Michael Mann, spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, said the bloc welcomed the Arab League's "strong and clear commitment and leadership".
The EU's first goal is an immediate cessation of killings and therefore we are very supportive of any initiative that can help achieve this objective, including a stronger Arab presence on the ground in cooperation with the U.N. to achieve a ceasefire and the end of violence.
Meanwhile, Syria categorically rejected the Arab League resolutions issued on Sunday, SANA news agency quoted Syria's Ambassador in Cairo Yousef Ahmed as saying on Monday. "The Arab Ministerial Council's decision has shamefully reflected the reality of abducing the Arab joint action, the League decisions and falsifying the Arab collective will by governments of Arab Countries led by Qatar and Saudi Arabia. It also showed a state of Hysteria and stumble that these governments are passing through after their failure in the UN Security council to call for foreign intervention in the Syrian affairs," Ahmad added.
Bashar Al-Assad received the AL draft resolution on Sunday night and was said to be assessing it by the state news agency. According to SANA, Assad will soon announce the draft the government had announced last October about plans for a new constitution.
The regime has promoted the plans as evidence of its intention to reform and Sana suggests this will transform Syria "into an example to follow in terms of public freedoms and political plurality."
However, the regime's opposition is unconvinced; pointing out that the drafting has been done without public dialogue.
One of the most criticised parts of the existing constitution is Article 8, which says: "The leading party in the society and the state is the Socialist Arab Baath Party."
Earlier on Monday, The Guardian reported Russian foreign minister as saying the government was reserving judgment on the Arab-UN peacekeeping proposal until it learns further details.
Sergei Lavrov said at a press conference that the government was studying the proposal, made by the Arab League last night, but that violence would have to end before any such mission takes place, Reuters reported
Earlier today, Reuters reported China's foreign ministry as pointing that, while it backed Arab Leage mediation in the country, there was no clear support for the call for the peacekeepers. Asked about the proposal, spokesman Liu Weimin was quoted by Reuters as saying: "China calls for and supports the Arab League's continued efforts at political mediation, which plays a proactive and constructive role with regard to peaceful settlement of the Syrian issue," Reuters reported.
Meanwhile, UK's foreign secretary William Hague has welcomed the Arab League's "significant steps" towards raising diplomatic pressure on the regime. In an official statement, he sadi: "We will discuss urgently with the Arab League and our international partners the proposals for a joint AL/UN peacekeeping force."
In Syria, regime forces resumed their bombardment of the city of Homs on Monday after Arab countries called for UN peacekeepers and pledged their firm support for the opposition battling Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad.
Opposition campaigners said scores of people were killed on Sunday after a lull in shelling the previous day. Sunday’s death toll was 36, including 15 in Deraa.
The government’s assault on Homs spurred Arab countries to ostracise Assad and promise tougher action. At a meeting in Cairo on Sunday, Arab League foreign ministers pledged for the first time to aid the opposition battling to overthrow Assad.
In Homs, government troops concentrated their fire on the Baba Amro neighbourhood in the south of the city and Al-Waer in the West, which borders the Military College, a main assembly point for tanks and government troops, opposition campaigners said.
Al-Waer, scene of large pro-democracy demonstrations for months, had come under attack in the last several days from pro-Assad militia known as shabbiha.
Meanwhile, a pause in the bombardment earlier in the day prompted anti-Asssd rallies in Homs's Qusour, Bayada and Khalidua and Bab Houd districts.
Demonstrations also broke out in Houla in the nearby countryside, which has also been under bombardment.
YouTube footage showed hundreds of youths holding shoulders and dancing under white-and-green Syrian flags from the time before Assad’s Baath Party took power in a 1963 coup.
“Dignified Homs is dying. The world sold it by its silence, Mothers are suffering, but our dear God does not forget anyone,” an activist sings as a crowd dances in front of him.
In the city of Hama, 50km (28 miles) north of Homs, loyalist forces backed by tanks and armoured vehicles raided neighborhoods on Sunday near the countryside where the Free Syrian Army has been active.
“It is the third day of such incursions. They fire heavy machineguns and anti-aircraft guns at random, then they go in and raid houses and arrest dozens of people. The objective is to separate Hama from the countryside,” activist Fady Al-Jaber said from Hama.
He said tank fire killed three people on the edge of the city on Saturday and that families had started to flee the area.
In Lebanon meanwhile, Homs reugees gave graphic accounts of what they had endured.
“The army of Bashar al-Assad destroyed our homes,” Abu Ibrahim told AFP.
“Before, we were bombarded by mortars or rocket-propelled grenades, but now they are using tanks and helicopters.”
Ibrahim said his 10-year-old daughter Nada had refused food since seeing dead bodies littering the streets of the besieged city.
The Syrian Arab Red Crescent and International Committee of the Red Cross said their “volunteers are distributing food, medical supplies, blankets, and hygiene consumables to thousands of people” in Homs.
The Arab League on Sunday also urged the UN Security Council to issue a resolution setting up a joint UN-Arab peacekeeping force to go to Syria and called for offering all forms of “political and material support” for the Syrian opposition, as the Syrian Ambassador to Cairo, Yousef Ahmad said that his country rejected the Arab decision “completely.”
Arab ministers met in Cairo to revive diplomatic efforts after the Arab initiative that called for Assad to step aside was stalled by the double veto in New York.
The resolution did not make clear whether the proposed joint UN-Arab peacekeeping force would involve armed troops, as in previous UN missions.
The resolution also called for “opening communication channels with the Syrian opposition and providing all forms of political and material support to it.” It also urged the Syrian opposition to unite.
The resolution said violence against civilians in Syria had violated international law and “perpetrators deserve punishment.” The resolution reaffirmed a call for Arabs to impose economic sanctions on Syria and decided on ending diplomatic cooperation with Damascus.
As part of the Arab efforts also, Tunisia said it would host the first meeting on February 24 of a “Friends of Syria” contact group made up of Arab and other states and backed by Western powers.
“The Syrian people deserve freedom as much as their brothers in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and other Arab states that witnessed major political change,” Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Ben Adessalam told ministers.
He announced that Tunisia would host the meeting of “Friends of Syria,” a plan proposed by France and the United States after Russia and China blocked the Security Council resolution.
UK Foreign Secretary William Hague said that the UK would play a "very active role" in the "Friends of Syria", but saidany peacekeeping force could only be sent in once Assad ended his brutal military crackdown against civilians.
"Such a mission could have an important role to play in saving lives, providing the Assad regime ends the violence against civilians, withdraws its forces from towns and cities and establishes a credible ceasefire," said Hague.
Meanwhile, the Syrian Ambassador to Cairo, Yousef Ahmad stated that his country rejected the Arab decision “completely.”
“The Syrian Arab Republic completely rejects the Arab League’s decision issued today, and it [Syria] has stressed before that it is not concerned with any Arab League decision issued in its absence,” he said in a press release.
Earlier, the Sudanese general heading an Arab League’s team of observers to Syria Mohamed Ahmad Al-Dabi resigned on Sunday amid harsh criticism of his performance and the eventual withdrawal of the mission.
The resignation of Al-Dabi was accepted by the Arab League foreign ministers meeting in Cairo.
Al-Dabi’s resignation came two weeks after the Arab League suspended the monitoring team’s mandate following an escalation in violence between the Syrian regime and protestors seeking to dethrone Al-Assad.
"I won’t work one more time in the framework of the Arab League," General Al-Dabi, told news agencies on Sunday.
"I performed my job with full integrity and transparency but I won’t work here again as the situation is skewed," he added.
The unrest in Syria has grown increasingly militarised with army defectors and protestors taking up arms against the regime as its crackdown intensified following the Russian and Chinese veto which blocked a UN Security Council’s resolution that would have backed an Arab plan urging Assad to quit.
Al-Dabi’s appointment last December as head of the mission, adopted as part of the Arab League’s plan to salvage the situation in Syria, faced a barrage of criticism from international right groups and Syrian activists.
In a press conference he held later in the Sudanese capital, the general expressed satisfaction with his report and the performance of the mission.
He blamed the media for failing to understand that the mandate of his mission is to monitor the violence not stop it.
The new battle at the United Nations will see UN human rights chief Navi Pillay brief the General Assembly on Monday about Syria. The meeting was called by assembly president Nassir Abdulaziz AlNasser, who is from Qatar.
Pillay is no longer keeping a count of the dead in Syria as she says accurate information is unobtainable. Syrian activist groups say more than 6,000 have died since protests erupted last March