BEIRUT — The head of the U.N. observers in Syria said Friday that a spike in bloodshed is derailing the mission to monitor and defuse more than a year of violence, raising questions about how effective the unarmed force can be in a conflict that every day looks more like a civil war.
The troubles facing the observer mission are the latest sign that an international peace plan for Syria is disintegrating. Western powers have pinned their hopes on the plan, brokered two months ago by special envoy Kofi Annan, in part because there are no other options on the table. There is little support for military intervention, and several rounds of sanctions have failed to stop the bloodshed.
“Violence over the past 10 days has been intensifying willingly by both parties, with losses on both sides and significant risks to our observers,” Maj. Gen. Robert Mood said in Damascus, the Syrian capital.
Mood also said there was a concern among the states providing observers that the risk is approaching an unacceptable level — suggesting the violence could prompt the nearly 300 observers to pull out of the country at some point.
Mood’s comments were the clearest sign yet that Annan’s peace plan is falling apart. The regime and the opposition have ignored a cease-fire that was supposed to go into effect April 12.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights called on the observers to “either work on stopping the killings or leave.” The group said the observers’ role has become to “witness the killing in Syria” rather than implement Annan’s six-point plan.
It was the harshest criticism of the observers by an activist group since they started their work in April.
On Friday, the Syrian regime kept up a ferocious offensive on rebel areas across the country. An activist in the northern city of Aleppo said troops backed by helicopters and tanks were engaged in “raging battles” several miles away in the rebel-held town of Anadan, and in other towns in the district.
Elsewhere, activists said Syrian troops heavily shelled the central city of Homs, which has come under attack for days.
Nationwide, at least 28 people were reported killed when security forces opened fire on protests, according to activists. That toll could not be independently verified.
Related news
Russia sending air and sea defenses to Syria, exporter says • MOSCOW — The chief of Russia’s state-controlled arms exporter said Friday that his company was shipping advanced defensive missile systems to Syria that could be used to shoot down airplanes or sink ships if the United States or other Western nations try to intervene to halt the country’s spiral of violence.
“I would like to say these mechanisms are really a good means of defense, a reliable defense against attacks from the air or sea,” said Anatoly Isaykin, general director of the company, Rosoboronexport. “This is not a threat, but whoever is planning an attack should think about this.”
His remarks come days after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton raised pressure on Russia, Syria’s patron, by criticizing the Kremlin for sending attack helicopters to Damascus. Although the weapons systems are not considered cutting-edge, the words and actions added to a Cold War chill that has been settling over relations between Washington and Moscow. The New York Times
