Friday, April 22, 2011

Deaths reported in Friday protests in Syra

Syrian security forces fired teargas on Friday to disperse a pro-democracy protest in the historic Midan district of Damascus, as thousands of protesters rallied in Deraa and Qamishli with the nationwide “Good Friday” rallies.

“The security fired the tear gas from a flyover overlooking Midan. They were over 2,000 protesters and now hundreds have re-grouped,” the witness told Reuters by phone as the chant “the people want the overthrow of the regime” was audible in the background.

French colonial forces heavily bombed Midan, a district just outside the walled boundaries of Old Damascus, during the 1925-1926 Great Syrian Revolt against French rule.
Several thousand people, meanwhile, demonstrated in the southern city of Deraa, calling for the “overthrow of the regime” of President Bashar al-Assad, witnesses said.

The protests, in the city which saw the outbreak of Syria’s five-week-old popular demonstrations, came a day after Mr. Assad lifted a draconian state of emergency which had been in place for nearly five decades—one of the key demands of the protesters.

Syria’s army deployed in the city of Homs and police put up checkpoints across the capital, witnesses said.

In the northeastern city of Qamishli, thousands of protesters demonstrated, Agence-France Presse reported.

Witnesses in Qamishli near the Turkish border said that around up to 6,000 demonstrators marched in the city waving Syrian flags, while some of the protesters carried banners calling for an end to corruption.

“Arabs, Syriac (Orthodox) and Kurds against corruption,” the banner said, according to one witness. Qamishli is a majority Kurdish city with Muslim and Christian communities.

Protesters also chanted, in Kurdish, “Liberty, fraternity,” said another witness.

Witnesses said between 5,000 and 6,000 protesters were taking part in the march that began outside the Qasmo mosque.

President Assad, 46, has been in power since his father, President Hafez al-Assad died in 2000, issued decrees Thursday to scrap the state of emergency as well as abolish the state security court and allow citizens to hold peaceful demonstrations.

The moves are aimed at placating a pro-democracy movement that has seen protests across the 23-million population country, ruled by one of the Middle East’s most fearsomely autocratic regimes since the Baath Party seized power 48 years ago.

Activists and rights groups have called the moves insufficient and urged the authorities not to suppress the “Good Friday” rallies which some said would test the regime’s sincerity in forging with reforms.

A Facebook group that has been a motor of the unprecedented protests called for the rallies spanning the Christian and Muslim faiths on “Good Friday,” which commemorates Jesus Christ’s crucifixion.

Friday is also the Muslim day of rest when the biggest demonstrations have been staged across Syria after weekly prayers in mosques.

Joshua Landis, head of the Center for Middle East Studies and associate professor at the University of Oklahoma in the United States, said, “Friday will be a day of reckoning,” according to AFP.

(Abeer Tayel of Al Arabiya

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