SYRIA LIVE BLOG
The UN says more than 100,000 people have died since the Syrian uprising began in March 2011. More than 1.5 million people have fled the country. Now, after months of inconclusive fighting between government forces and rebels, an alleged chemical weapons attack in a Damascus suburb has escalated diplomatic tensions and fuelled talk of Western military intervention.
Syria
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UN special envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, joined a gathering of the leaders of the world's 20 top economies in St Petersburg to discuss the ongoing crisis in Syria.
"The current situation caused by the allegations of chemical weapon use and deteriorating humanitarian situation in Syria urgently require world leaders to focus their political will to address this issue," Ban said.
Ban said he asked Brahimi to come to the G20 summit to help him "press for the early convening of Geneva II conference".
"There is no military solution, there is only political solution which can be bring peace and end this bloodshed right now," said Ban.
[AP]
Syria
Al Jazeera's Naser Shaded, in Deraa province, said many people there were anticipating an attack on Syria by the US.
But they think that if strikes don't lead to the fall of Assad's regime, it will be problem because this would turn Assad into more of a "champion", especially in Arab world.
Therefore, people who oppose the regime hope for a strong attack, Shaded said.
"They need Assad to fall down, otherwise they think that there is no need for an attack," he said.
Syria
Samantha Power, the US ambassador to the United Nations, speaks about the situation in Syria at UN's headquarters in New York.
Syria
Rebels say they have taken control of the mainly Christian village of Maaloula, outside the capital, Damascus.
As the war continues, Al Jazeera’s Mohamed Vall takes a look at the make-up of the armed groups in Syria.
Syria
Four people were killed and six others injured in a car bomb attack in western Damascus on Thursday, Syrian state news agency SANA reported.
The blast hit near a research and testing centre affiliated with the Ministry of Industry in the Soumariya neighbourhood of the Syrian capital.
"A terrorist car bomb attack killed four people and wounded six others," SANA reported, adding that the blast damaged shops and cars near the centre.
The centre, established in 1965, tests industrial products, its website says.
Syria
Reuters news agency has just reported that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's former defence minister reached Istanbul on Thursday after a defection that betrays cracks in the president's support among his own Alawite sect.
Dismissing a cursory Syrian state television denial of the first Reuters report that General Ali Habib had been spirited across the Turkish frontier this week, opposition figures said Habib was likely to keep a low profile after evading house arrest and reaching Turkey with the aid of Western agents, according to the news agency.
One prominent opposition figure also spoke of speculation that Habib, who is in his 70s and apparently broke with Assad after a crackdown on protesters in 2011, might be lined up by
US and Russian officials for a role in transitional arrangements to negotiate an end to the civil war.
US and Russian officials for a role in transitional arrangements to negotiate an end to the civil war.
"My information, based on a trusted Western source, is that he is in Istanbul," veteran dissident Kamal al-Labwani, now based in Paris, told Reuters on Thursday. "Habib exited with
Western intelligence involvement, so do not expect public statements by security operatives on his whereabouts."
Western intelligence involvement, so do not expect public statements by security operatives on his whereabouts."
A source in one of the Gulf Arab states that is backing the revolt against Assad said Habib had crossed Turkey's southern border after dark on Tuesday and had reached Istanbul, a base
for the Western-backed Syrian National Coalition.
for the Western-backed Syrian National Coalition.
A Western diplomatic source said he had confirmation that Habib had defected and was in Turkey. He dismissed a brief report on Syrian state television on Wednesday which said he was still at his home.
The station has not repeated that denial and other state media have not mentioned Habib.
The Turkish government, which hosts Syrian military officers who have defected, has not confirmed the general's presence. He has not been seen in public this week.
[Reuters]
Syria
The leaders of the G20 have gathered for an economic summit almost totally eclipsed by the Syrian crisis.
Al Jazeera's Barnaby Phillips reports from outside Constantine Palace in St Petersburg where the meeting is taking place.
Syria
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem will travel to Moscow for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Monday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
The ministry said talks will focus on "the current situation in Syria", where the United States is mulling a military strike after Washington said it had evidence that President Bashar
al-Assad used chemical arms against civilians.
al-Assad used chemical arms against civilians.
[Reuters]
Syria
A Syrian surgeon working for the international medical organisation Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has been killed in northern Syria.
Dr Muhammad Abyad’s body was found on September 3 in Aleppo province said MSF in a written statement.
The organization condemned the attack saying that the exact circumstances of Abyad’s death remain unclear.
Medical Committee of the Free Aleppo Governorate Council which Abyad was member of said in a seperate statement that 28 year old orthopedic surgeon was kidnapped by an armed group that stormed the medics' residence in Sajou village in rural Aleppo at 1:30 AM on Monday 2nd September 2013.
"He was kidnapped and taken to an unknown location, with his dead body being sighted close to the town of Deir Jamal in the evening of the same day” the council said.
Speaking to Al Jazeera in the condition of anonymity, one of the Abyad’s friends, said that he had been threatened with death by one of the Islamic groups on charges of that he is secular and liberal.
Syria
Pope Francis has urged leaders of the Group of 20 to abandon the "futile pursuit" of a military solution in Syria and workinstead for dialogue and negotiation to end the conflict.
In a letter on Thursday to the G-20 host, Russian President Vladimir Putin,popelamented that "one-sided interests" had prevailed in Syria, preventing a peaceful solution and allowing the continued ``senseless massacre'' of innocents.
Pope has ratcheted up his call for peace in Syria amid threatened US-led military strikes following a chemical weapons attack. He will host a peace vigil in St. Peter's Square on Saturday.
On Thursday, the Vatican summoned ambassadors accredited to the Holy See to outline its position, calling for the respect for all minorities including Christians and
that Syria's opposition forces distance themselves from extremists.
that Syria's opposition forces distance themselves from extremists.
SYRIA LIVE BLOG
The UN says more than 100,000 people have died since the Syrian uprising began in March 2011. More than 1.5 million people have fled the country. Now, after months of inconclusive fighting between government forces and rebels, an alleged chemical weapons attack in a Damascus suburb has escalated diplomatic tensions and fuelled talk of Western military intervention.
Syria
Allegations the Syrian regime used chemical weapons on August 21 are a "pretext" to attack the country, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday.
The United States and their allies "are using the chemical weapon (allegation) as a pretext," and "are saying that they want to intervene for humanitarian reasons," said Khamenei, who is a key backer of the Damascus regime US President Barack Obama is seeking Congress' approval for limited strikes against Syria.
- Agence France Presse
Ayatollah Ali Khamanei, damascus, Barack Obama,US
Syria
Syrian anti-regime activists say government troops and al-Qaeda-linked rebels are fighting over a regime-held Christian village for a second day.
The director of the Britain-based Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdul-Rahman, says the fighters of al-Qaeda affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra entered the Christian village of Maaloula overnight.
Despite heavy army presence in the village in Western Syria, Abdul-Rahman says the rebels patrolled its streets on foot and in vehicles, briefly surrounding a church and a mosque.
He says the rebels left Maaloula early Thursday morning and heavy clashes between President Bashar Assad's troops and Nusra Front fighters have raged since then in surrounding mountains.
The Observatory has been documenting conflict since it started in March 2011 and has relied on a network of activists on the ground.
- Associated Press
SOHR, Bashar al Assad,Ramia Abdul Rahman. al qaeda
Syria
Amid talks of a military strike against the Assad regime, people in neighbouring Jordan are growing more concerned.
Many are against an armed intervention, fearing they could get caught in the line of fire.
Many are against an armed intervention, fearing they could get caught in the line of fire.
Al Jazeera's Nisreen El-Shamayleh reports from the border town of Al Ramtha:
Syria
Iran will support Syria "until the end" in the face of possible US-led military strikes, the chief of Iran's elite Quds Force unit was quoted Thursday by the media as saying.
Iran is Syria's main regional ally and some analysts believe a wider goal of US President Barack Obama's determination to launch a strike against the Damascus regime is to blunt Tehran's growing regional influence and any consequent threat to Washington ally Israel.
"The aim of the United States is not to protect human rights ... but to destroy the front of resistance (against Israel)," Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani was quoted as saying.
"We will support Syria to the end," he added in a speech to the Assembly of Experts, the body that supervises the work of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
He did not elaborate on the nature of the support and Iran has constantly denied allegations by Western powers that it has sent military forces to prop up President Bashar al-Assad's embattled regime.
Iran's Defence Minister Hossein Dehqan, meanwhile, ruled out sending troops or weapons to Syria.
"The Syrians do not need us to provide them with weapons because they have a defensive anti-aircraft system themselves," he was cited in the local media as saying.
- Agence France Presse
Hossein Dehqan, Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, US,Bashar al Assad
Syria
The Turkish lira weakened to its record low on Thursday after the central bank failed to reassure investors on its strategy to support the currency and on worries that potential military strikes on Syria could hurt the Turkish economy.
The lira weakened to 2.0803 against the dollar by 0829 GMT, from 2.0606 late on Wednesday. It was also near record lows against the dollar/euro basket at 2.4071.
- Reuters
lira, Istanbul, Ankara, damascus, US,Obama
Syria
Russia said Thursday it would warn a meeting of the UN's atomic watchdog next week that any US military strikes in Syria could hit a nuclear research reactor there.
"Russia will for sure raise this topic at the autumn session of the board of governors of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) opening on September 9 in Vienna," a foreign ministry spokesman told AFP.
Russia warned on Wednesday that US military strikes in Syria could have "catastrophic" consequences for nuclear safety if they hits a research reactor in the suburbs of Damascus.
Moscow, which has supported the regime of Bashar al Assad throughout the two-and-a-half-year conflict, called on IAEA to "quickly react" to the situation and provide its country members with an analysis of risks linked to the possible use of force against Syria.
- Agence France Presse
US, Bashar al Assad,IAEA
Syria
The UN-Arab League envoy on Syria Lakhdar Brahimi is heading to Russia to help UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's efforts at the G20 to organise a peace conference to end the conflict, the UN said Thursday.
"The Secretary General has just announced that the Joint Special Representative for Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, is on his way to Russia to help him push, on margins of the G20 summit in Saint Petersburg, for the International Conference on Syria," the UN spokesperson said in a statement.
- Agence France Presse
Lakhdar Brahimi, UN, Ban Ki-moon,G20
Syria
UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos arrived in the Syrian capital Damascus on Thursday for talks with government officials, a UN source told AFP.
Amos's visit comes shortly after the United Nations announced that the number of Syrian refugees had passed the two million mark since the country's conflict began in March 2011.
Amos, who is due to leave Syria on Friday, has visited Damascus before, and has called in recent months for increased attention to the plight of Syria's displaced and refugee population.
Last month, she joined UN rights chief Navi Pillay in calling for increased humanitarian access to Syria.
"Insecurity, coupled with bureaucratic constraints and limitations on the number of NGOs allowed to operate in Syria, continue to prevent aid reaching all those in need," Amos warned.
- Agence France Presse
Valerie Amos, Navi Pillay,UN
Syria
A group of US senators has approved a resolution authorising the use of force in Syria.
There still needs to be a vote on the resolution in the full Senate that is likely to take place next week.
Al Jazeera's Kimberley Halkett reports from Washington.
Syria
China warned on Thursday that a military strike on Syria would hurt the global economy, in particular by causing oil prices to rise, and reiterated its calls for a political solution to the civil war.
"Military action would have a negative impact on the global economy, especially on the oil price - it will cause a hike in the oil price," Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao told a briefing on the sidelines of a Group of 20 summit.
- Reuters
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