Death toll on the rise across Syria as security troops fire on protesters

ADO – Agencies : As many as fourteen people were killed on Sunday as Syrian security forces pressed a crackdown on political dissent in separate hubs of protest against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, activists told Al Arabiya. They said that the highest death toll was reported in the city of Homs, when ten people have been killed by the fire of security forces.

In Beirut, witnesses said that the security guards of the Syrian embassy attacked a group of Syrian protesters.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in emailed statements received by AFP in Nicosia that four civilians died in the central city of Homs when security forces opened fire on a protest outside the home of a detained activist, Mansur al-Arassi.

Others were killed outside a mosque in the Khaldiyeh sector of the city by attackers who opened fire from a vehicle, the Britain-based Observatory said. It said 39 people were wounded in the two incidents.

In the Damascus region, one person was killed in the town of Zabadani, where security forces earlier arrested 25 people, including three young women.

The Observatory said the death occurred when security forces fired on people after they left a mosque and began protesting in the streets calling for the release of detainees.

In Idlib province of northwest Syria, two people were killed in Khan Sheikhun near the border with Turkey when security forces fired live rounds to break up a protest, the Observatory said

Source: Al Arabiya net

17/10/2011