Houla Massacre
BEIRUT - More than 300 people were killed in Syria on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, in one of the bloodiest days in the 18-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.
World leaders meeting at the United Nations have expressed concern at the continuing violence in Syria but are deadlocked over their response to the conflict, which the Observatory says has claimed 30,000 lives since March 2011.
The British-based organization, which monitors violence in Syria through a network of activists, said in a report released on Thursday that 55 people were killed in rural areas around Damascus. They included at least 40 who appeared to have been shot in cold blood in the town of al-Dhiyabia, southeast of the capital.
Other activists have put the death toll in al-Dhiyabia as high as 107, blaming Assad's security forces for what they said was a massacre. Video published by activists showed rows of bloodied corpses wrapped in blankets. The victims shown on camera appeared to be male, from 20-year-olds to elderly men.
The Observatory also said 14 people were killed in a rebel bomb attack on a military command centre in Damascus and in an ensuing prolonged gunbattle between rebels and security forces.
Violence in Syria has deepened as the fight against Assad has became more militarized and the president has responded with increasing use of force - including regular air strikes and bombardments against rebel areas.
In the first nine months of the conflict, the United Nations human rights chief said around 5,000 people had been killed. U.N. officials have given up trying to monitor the violence but the Observatory's figures suggest five times as many people have been killed in the second nine-month period.
The Centre for Documentation of Violations in Syria, which is linked to the grassroots anti-Assad Local Coordination Committees, puts the overall death toll at 27,318.
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Syrian rebels detonated two suicide car bombs at President Bashar al-Assad's heavily guarded army headquarters in Damascus Wednesday, killing four security guards and sparking a gunbattle in which an Iranian journalist also died.
Security video aired by Syrian state TV showed a white van driving on a busy street outside the military compound, then veering to the right and exploding. The video showed a second blast going off inside the complex.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that after the second explosion, rebel fighters and government forces exchanged fire for more than three hours.
Syrian state TV reported that four army guards were killed and 14 people were wounded, including civilians and military personnel. Iran's Press TV said one of its correspondents was killed by sniper fire and the Damascus bureau chief for another state-run news organization was wounded reporting on the bombings.
Information Minister Omran Zoubi blamed the attack on terrorists, a term the government uses for rebels opposed to Mr. Assad.
The explosions are the latest to hit the capital during the country's 18-month conflict, following a bombing Tuesday at a building occupied by pro-government militias. Rebels said they hoped that attack would kill top-level security officials.
Last month, bombings struck the state television headquarters in Damascus and near a hotel used by United Nations observers. A bomb attack in July killed Syria's sitting defense minister and three other top security officials.
World leaders speaking at the annual session of the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday called for an end to the conflict in Syria.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the assembly the world must “stop the violence and flows of arms to both sides, and set in motion a Syrian-led transition as soon as possible.”
France called for U.N. protection of rebel-held areas to help end Syria's bloodshed and rights abuses.
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