Tanks storm Syrian flashpoint city of Banias as opposition leader Riad Seif arrested
- Three women protesters shot dead by Syrian forces, says campaigner
- Banias Residents reporting heavy gunfire and Syrian navy boats off coast
- Syrian forces arrest opposition leader Riad Seif at a pro-democracy demo
Syrian army units stormed into the city of Banias with tanks overnight, attacking Sunni districts that had defied President Bashar al-Assad's autocratic rule, a human rights campaigner said today.
The units entered the coastal city, a majority of whose residents are Sunni Muslims, from three directions, advancing into Sunni districts but not Alawite neighbourhoods, said the campaigner.
Most communications with Banias have been cut but the campaigner was able to contact some residents, he said.
Confrontation: A grab taken off a YouTube video shows tanks headed in the direction of the Syrian coastal town of Banias on Thursday
Assad belongs to the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, and Alawites occupy most senior positions in the army and security apparatus.
‘Residents are reporting the sound of heavy gunfire and seeing Syrian navy boats off the Banias coast. Sunni and mixed neighbourhoods are totally besieged now,’ said the rights campaigner, who did not want to be identified.
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A protest leader said earlier this week that Syrian forces and gunmen loyal to Assad had moved on Tuesday into areas of central Banias that had been under the control of pro-democracy demonstrators for weeks.
The coastal city has witnessed some of the most persistent demonstrations since an uprising erupted in the southern city of Deraa seven weeks ago demanding political freedom and an end to corruption.
Syrian member of Parliament and leading opposition activist Riad Seif, who was arrested yesterday
Mostly Sunni districts of Banias have been under the control of demonstrators since Assad loyalists, known as ‘al-shabbiha’, fired at residents from speeding cars on April 10, after a large demonstration that demanded the ‘overthrow of the regime’.
Six civilians were killed that day, according to residents and human rights campaigners.
Estimates have suggested that more than 500 Syrians have been killed in total - including three women today - and a further 2,500 detained during the protests.
A human rights campaigner told Reuters that Syrian forces fired at a small all-women protest marching on the main coastal highway from Marqab village near Banias, killing three protesters.
Authorities described Banias as a ‘centre of Salafist terrorism’ and said armed groups had killed soldiers near the city. Civic leaders in Banias issued a statement denying the accusation and saying the authorities were trying to spread fear among the Alawites.
Protest leader Anas Shughri said earlier this week: ‘They are targeting Sunnis. I regret to say that the propaganda that Assad is spreading that the Alawites will not survive if he is toppled is receiving an audience among our Alawite neighbours, although the demonstrations have been for freedom and unity, regardless of sect.’
Unrest: Syrian anti-government protesters gathering in the coastal town of Banias yesterday
The message is clear: Syrians in Banias protest against the regime of President Assad, with one holding up some writing that spells out their aim
Yesterday Syrian security forces also arrested opposition leader Riad Seif at a pro-democracy demonstration in the Midan district of Damascus, his daughter and human rights campaigners said.
‘My father was shoved into a bus with other protesters who were detained during the demonstration near the al-Hassan mosque,’ Jumana Seif told Reuters.
Seif, 64, has prostate cancer. He spent a total of eight years as a political prisoner on charges of ‘weakening national morale’, a charge regularly used by the Syrian authorities against opposition and independent figures critical of Syria's autocratic rule.
Seif was first jailed in 2001 after helping initiate a peaceful movement demanding political freedoms and democracy in Syria. He also criticised business monopolies tied to the ruling Assad family. He was released last year after completing a second sentence.
Last week, Assad ordered the army into Deraa, the centre of the uprising that began with demands for greater freedom and an end to corruption and is now pressing for his removal.
An ultra-loyalist division led by President al-Assad's brother Maher shelled and machinegunned Deraa's old quarter on Saturday, residents said.
The United States, which had joined a European drive to improve ties with Assad under the Obama administration, called the attack on Deraa 'barbaric'.
An official handout photo from the Syrian nes agency showing the funeral procession of Khodr Hammoud, one of ten policemen and army officers the authorities say was killed by 'terrorists' in Homs
Another handout photo said to be the remains of a burned-out bus torched in Hama
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