Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Adventurer]

But the demonstrators did not achieve any of their goal, which was to "get the army to switch sides" and stop shooting at protesters, she said.

The fresh violence came amid a brutal military crackdown on protests, that have swept the country for weeks and shaken the one-party rule of president Bashar al-Assad.

More than a 1,000 people are believed to have been killed in the crackdown to date.

The harsh crackdown has triggered international outrage and US and European sanctions, including an EU assets freeze and a visa ban on Assad and nine members of his regime.

Amnesty International, the human rights group, has accused Syrian security forces of deliberately killing hundreds of demonstrators in the city of Deraa.

G8 shock over deaths

Group of Eight [G8] leaders attending a summit in France on Friday said they were "appalled" at the killing of peaceful protesters in Syria, and are considering "further measures" against the country.

"We are appalled by the deaths of many peaceful protesters as a result of the sweeping use of violence in Syria as well as by repeated and serious violations of human rights," the leaders said in the communique on Friday.

But the statement refrained from an explicit proposal, contained in earlier drafts of the document obtained by the Associated Press, to act against Damascus in the UN Security Council.
Sarkozy echoed Obama's call for Bashar al-Assad to make a choice: democracy or step down. [AFP]

Should the Syrian authorities not heed this call, we will consider further measures. We are convinced that only by implementing meaningful reforms will a democratic Syria be able to play a positive role in the region," it said.

The shift in language to a vaguer threat of "further measures" may reflect reluctance from Russia, which has a veto in the Security Council.

French president Nicolas Sarkozy echoed US president Barack Obama's call for Syrian leader Assad to lead a transition to democracy or to step down.

"President Assad now has a choice. He can lead that transition or get out of the way. The Syrian government must stop shooting demonstrators and allow peaceful protests," Sarkozy said on Friday at the end of the G8 summit in Deauville, France.

Both Russia and China have been reluctant to support any UN resolution condemning Syria. Russia has in the past accused NATO of going beyond their brief on the UN resolution in Libya.

More than 220 civil society organisations from across the Arab world appealed to the Security Council this week to adopt a resolution demanding an immediate end to the use of lethal force against protesters in Syria.


http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/05/201152791250989274.html