Syrian opposition refuses Moscow talks: Russia

World News

Moscow: Syria's fundamental Western-sponsored restriction gathering is declining to take an interest in talks in Moscow, Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Friday. Service representative Alexander Lukashevich said the Syrian National Coalition was ''blocking and declining to take part'' in the talks, which might keep tabs on determining the compassionate emergency in

Car bomb kills six in central Syria

World News

Damascus: An auto shell killed six individuals, three of them kids, and wounded 37 others in the focal Syrian territory of Homs on Monday, state-run Sana news org reported. It said "terrorists" - the official tag for radicals battling to topple

Syria says Kerry statements threaten peace talks

World News

Damascus: The Syrian outside service Sunday upbraided remarks by Us Secretary of State John Kerry on Syria, platitude they could reason proposed peace chats on the 31-month clash to fall flat. A proclamation said that comments by Kerry

Shelling continues for some Syrian refugees

Fraidis, Lebanon - Late during the evening a month ago, a flood of mortars collided with the peaceful horticultural fields encompassing Fraidis, a village in Lebanon's bankrupted Akkar region, less than two kilometres far from the Syrian fringe. "Everything happens around

Israel strikes Russian weapons shipment in Syria

Beirut: Israeli warplanes assaulted a shipment of Russian rockets inside a Syrian government fortress, authorities said Thursday, an improvement that undermined to add an alternate unpredictable layer to

Syria destroys chemical arms equipment: watchdog

The Hague: An official at the worldwide compound weapons watchdog said Thursday Syria has finished annihilation of basic gear for transforming synthetic weapons and filling weapons with toxic substance gas. The official spoke

Syria has destroyed chemical production facilities: watchdog

Beirut: Syria has decimated every last bit of its pronounced synthetic weapons processing and blending offices, gathering a major due date in a goal-oriented demobilization programme, the worldwide substance weapons watchdog said in a report seen by Reuters. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said in the report its groups had examined 21 out of 23 synthetic weapons destinations the nation over. The other two were so perilous there was no option examine however the concoction gear had as of recently been moved

500 civilians evacuated from besieged Syrian town

Beirut: Some 500 ladies, kids and elderly regular folks trapped in the blockaded town of Moadamiyet al-Sham, southwest of Damascus, have been cleared, activists said. Directed by the Red Crescent, the citizens were escorted from the Syrian revolt town on Tuesday, as a team with the Damascus administration. "The Red Crescent has cleared 500 citizens" from Moadamiyet al-Sham, restriction activists in the town reported through Facebook. "All sides, without exemption, joined (in the clearing), incorporating the restriction as spoke to by the National Coalition, the administration... also the global group," they said. Rebel-held Moadamiyet al-Sham has been under a suffocating armed force attack for a year. Rights bunches and activists have reported far reaching hunger in the town, especially around kids, due to an aggregate bar on the section of nourishment and other basic merchandise. The armed force shells Moadamiyet al-Sham every day, and crashes lash out on its edge. The town was the scene of one of the guard's substance assaults close Damascus on August 21, which slaughtered many individuals. Activists in the town issued an articulation expression they might have favored helpful support to be gotten rather, "yet we didn't have a decision". The regular folks who have left the town have now joined the a huge number of inside uprooted individuals in Syria's clash. They are, no doubt moved to "camps set up by the administration in the edge of Qudsaya (close Damascus), as a team with the Red Crescent," said the activists. Tuesday's clearing was the second operation of its benevolent since October 12, when 3,000 citizens were assumed transports. The resistance and Un helpful boss Valerie Amos have both called for compassionate passages into Moadamiyet al-Sham.

Syrian president grants general amnesty

Damascus: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad allowed a general acquittal, blanket criminal acts perpetrated before Oct 29, a media report said The new presidential exculpation blankets criminal acts specified in the military administration law, incorporating those of escaping from the obligatory administration, reported Xinhua, spelling no further items if the absolution blankets different wrongdoings aside from the military ones. Assad has prior issued numerous pardons that secured numerous wrongdoings notwithstanding the military ones. The new move came as arrangements for the Geneva Ii gathering on Syria which tries to uncover a political answer for the long-standing clash in the nation.

WHO confirms polio outbreak in Syria

Geneva: The World Health Organisation (Who) said Tuesday that 10 instances of spoiling with wild poliovirus sort 1 had been affirmed in Syria. Twenty-two kids with intense flabby loss of motion (Afp) in the nation's Deir al-Zour region were accounted for Oct 17 and wild poliovirus has been segregated in examples taken from 10 cases. Comes about on the other 12 were normal inside days, Xinhua reported. As per the Who, the majority of the cases are of children underneath two years of age and were un-immunised or under-immunised. Evaluated immunisation rates in Syria declined from 91 percent in 2010 to 68 percent in 2012. It said that Oct 24, an extensive scale supplementary immunisation action (Sia) was started in Syria to inoculate 1.6 million kids against polio, measles, mumps and rubella, in both government-regulated and challenged zones. Bigger scale flare-up reaction crosswise over Syria and neighbouring nations is expected to start in unanticipated November, to keep going for no less than six to eight months hinging upon the region and dependent upon advancing the study of disease transmission, it said. The Who cautioned that the danger of further global spread of wild poliovirus sort 1 over the district is acknowledged to be high because of incessant populace developments over the area and subnational resistance crevices in key regions. An observation alarm has been issued for the area to energetically look for extra potential cases. All travellers to and from polio-contaminated regions are suggested to be completely inoculated against polio. Polio is a remarkably irresistible infection that attacks the anxious framework and can cause irreversible loss of motion in a matter of hours. It causes perpetual loss of motion in one of each 200 spoiled people. The infection is regularly spread through fecal-oral transmission and generally influences kids under age five.

Only Syrians can choose their future: minister

October 29: Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem told Un-Arab League emissary Lakhdar Brahimi today that just the Syrian individuals can pick their destiny and guides, official news org Sana reported. He made the remarks as Brahimi went to Damascus to gather underpin for starting peace talks in Geneva pointed at uncovering a political answer for the clash. "Syria will go to Geneva Ii dependent upon the restrictive right of the Syrian individuals to pick their political future, to pick their guides and to reject all types of outer mediation," Muallem said. "The exchange will happen between Syrians," he included, dismissing provincial and universal obstruction in any discourse. He likewise said that all proclamations in regards to what's to come for the nation, especially "the one from London," were "encroachments on the privileges of the Syrian individuals," and "preconditions to the discourse before it has even begun." That was a reference to the October 22 gathering of the purported Friends of Syria aggregation of nations, key benefactors of the Syrian resistance. At the gathering, Western and Arab powers concurred with Syrian resistance heads that president Bashar al-Assad had no anticipated part to play in the nation. Brahimi demanded that the Geneva talks might be "between the Syrian parties" and that just Syrians might choose their anticipated, Sana reported. He included that there was a concession to "the imperativeness of consummation the viciousness, terrorism and regarding Syrian power," as per Sana. As Brahimi presses his tour to find support for a peace gathering, named Geneva Ii, its prospects stay in mistrust, with Syria's progressively broken dissidents having yet to say if they will go to. The fundamental resistance National Coalition has said it will decline to go to talks unless Assad's acquiescence is on the table - an interest denied by Damascus. Assad himself has given occasion to feel qualms about the probability of talks, and has said he won't arrange with any aggregation fixing to the revolutionaries battling his strengths or to outside states.

Syria's chemical attack ability 'limited' after OPCW destroys after key equipment

Washington, October 29: Syria's capability to start an expansive scale substance assault has been constrained emulating decimation of all its key gear and offices by worldwide monitors, U.s. furthermore European authorities said. The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (Opcw) said that its examination groups have affirmed that major divide of the supplies utilized by Syria to arrange its substance weapons have been rendered inoperable, the Washington Post reports. The Opcw groups had gone to 21 out-of-23 synthetic weapons locales announced by Syria, and in a few cases even crushed the machines with mallets that were being utilized to fill concoction warheads with sarin and other deadly poisons. The two remaining locales, placed in zones designated to be dangerous in view of renegade warriors, are accepted to be just space offices, esteemed insignificant by the monitors in their quest for the munititions stockpiles. Syria consented to surrender its stockpile under a Russia-American conciliatory bargain, after the Obama organization undermined to start a military strike as discipline for professedly striking two Damascus suburbs with sarin gas on August 21, executing more than 1,400 individuals in the war-torn country. (Ani)

Peace envoy says Assad could contribute to 'new' Syria

October 28: Un-Arab League emissary Lakhdar Brahimi, who landed in Damascus today, accepts President Bashar al-Assad could help the move to "another" Syria, yet not as the nation's guide. Brahimi, who was in Syria on the most recent leg of a territorial tour to rally back for peace talks, spoke about Assad in a meeting in Paris with the Jeune Afrique site distributed today. "Large portions of the aforementioned around (Assad) accept his nomination (for another presidential term in 2014) is an actuality. He acknowledges this an outright right... He supposes most importantly of finishing his order," the veteran Algerian ambassador said. In any case, "what history shows us is that after an emergency like this there is no backtracking. President Assad could in this manner functionally help the move from the Syria of soon after, that of his father (the late president Hafez al-Assad) and himself, to what I call the new Republic of Syria." Brahimi said the Us-Russian accord to destroy Syria's concoction stockpile had converted Assad from an "untouchable" into an "accomplice" and persuaded his supporters considerably a greater amount of his capacity to win. Brahimi additionally confronts a daunting task in persuading the broke restriction to go to the Geneva talks, after 19 Islamist revolt aggregations cautioned that anybody participating in the talks might be recognized a swindler. "This meeting is the start of a methodology. We trust that the restriction will devise a workable plan to concede to a believable and delegate appointment," Brahimi said. "We ought not cheat ourselves: the whole planet won't be available. Anyway as the methodology proceeds, it might as well incorporate however much of the planet as could reasonably be expected." Brahimi, a veteran global troubleshooter, said he expected that if a settlement couldn't be arrived at Syria might turn into a fizzled state like Somalia, which has not had a working government for two decades. "The true risk in Syria is not the part of the nation. The true threat is a kind of "Somalisation," yet significantly more profound and enduring than what we have seen in Somalia.

Arab foreign ministers to meet over Syria Nov 3

Cairo : The Arab outside clergymen will meet here Nov 3 to talk about the most recent advancements of the Syrian emergency, Egypt's official news office Mena reported Monday. The gathering, to be held in the Arab League (Al) central command in Cairo, will handle the conclusion of Un-Arab League joint exceptional emissary to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi's visit to distinctive nations in the locale and arrangements for the Geneva Ii Conference, Xinhua refered to Mena as citing a strategic source. The gathering happened upon an appeal from the Syrian resistance which looks for an Arab blanket over the meeting in face of current back for the Syrian government from some provincial and global forces, the source included. The leader of the Syrian resistance coalition, Ahmed A'ssi Gerba, had asked Al head Nabil al-Arabi to back the Syrian restriction in bringing together its stances and taking shape its dreams provided that it chooses to tune in the gathering, the source included.

Syria submits plan for chemical weapons' destruction

Damascus: Syria has submitted a beginning announcement of its synthetic weapon programme, incorporating a general arrange of their pulverization, the Organisation of the Prohibition of the Chemical Weapons (Opcw) said Sunday. "The Syrian Arab Republic submitted to the Opcw its formal introductory revelation blanket its concoction weapons programme," the Opcw said in a comment, Xinhua reported. It included that the report from Syria incorporates a general arrange of pulverization for thought by the Opcw official committee. "Syria's tameness is in accordance with the due date set by the Opcw Executive Council in its choice of Sep 27, 2013 needing a complete introductory statement by Oct 27, 2014. "Such revelations furnish the foundation on which plans are contrived for an orderly, sum and checked annihilation of pronounced substance weapons and handling offices," the proclamation said. The United Nations Security Council said the Opcw will help Syria devastate its synthetic weapons by mid-2014. The mission will be extended with additional examiners landing in the agitation torn nation by Nov 1.

Health situation in Syria continues to deteriorate: WHO

Geneva: The health situation in Syria has been deteriorating due to a shortage of medicines and medical workers, the destruction of health facilities and difficult access to health care, said the WHO. Till July 2013, 64 percent of the country's public hospitals have been affected by the conflict, which erupted in March 2011. Among them, 24 percent has been damaged, and the rest is out of service, Xinhua quoted Tarik Jasarevic, spokesman of the World Health Organization (WHO) as saying Friday. More than 50 percent of skilled health workers have left the country. The situation is worse in affected areas. For example, at least 70 percent of the medical doctors have left Homs, said Jasarevic. Due to substantial damages to pharmaceutical plants, local production of medicines has reduced to 70 percent. Before the conflict started, 90 percent of medicines in Syria were locally produced, he said. He said that epidemiological situation remains stable with no major outbreak reported. The measles epidemic receded due to the vaccination campaigns last May supported by the UNICEF and WHO, he said. UNICEF spokesperson Matrix Mercado said that the agency has joined the WHO and other partners in mounting a large-scale immunization effort aimed at protecting children both in the country and across the region against polio and other vaccine-preventable diseases. Around 500,000 children in Syria have not been vaccinated against polio in the past two years due to insecurity and access constraints. Prior to the conflict, immunization coverage in Syria was about 95 percent, according to the UNICEF.

40 die in Syria car bomb attack

Cairo: Forty people were killed Friday in a car bombing near a mosque in Damascus province, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The dead include women and children and many of the dozens of injured are in serious condition, activists told the observatory. The scene of the explosion, a village called Suq Wadi Barada, is controlled by rebels, but Syrian government forces are deployed just outside the community, the activists said. The National Coalition, representing a wide range of opposition groups, blamed forces loyal to President Bashar Assad for the blast, which occurred just as worshippers at the mosque were concluding Friday prayers. Official news agency Sana attributed the attack to "terrorists". The United Nations estimates that Syria's internal conflict has claimed more than 100,000 lives since March 2011, when violence erupted in the wake of harsh government repression of peaceful protests.

Car bomb at Syria mosque killed 40, including 7 children: NGO

October 25: The toll from yesterday's car bomb explosion at a mosque in Suq Wadi Barada near Damascus has soared to at least 40, including seven children, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Syrian government and opposition exchanged blame for the carnage in the town. Suq Wadi Barada is under rebel control and ringed by troops loyal to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. "The toll from a car bomb explosion that detonated after Friday prayers in Suq Wadi Barada has risen to 40, including seven children and a woman," said the Observatory. "The number of dead is likely to rise because there are dozens of wounded, most of them in critical condition," it added. State news agency SANA had earlier reported the blast, blaming "terrorists", the term the Assad regime uses for forces fighting to oust it. The opposition National Coalition meanwhile blamed the Assad regime for the "massacre" caused by what it said were two car bombs placed outside the Osama Bin Zeid mosque in Suq Wadi Barada. "Bashar al-Assad's gangs detonated two car bombs at midday... That were planted in front of the Osama Bin Zeid mosque in Suq Wadi Barada," the Coalition said in a statement. "The regime's constant commission of massacres makes it the duty of countries of the free world, the friends of the Syrian people, as well as international human rights and humanitarian organisations to fulfil their responsibilities towards civilians," it added. They must "protect the lives of Syrians and uphold their rights." Car bombings have plagued Syria in recent months, killing scores across the country.