GENEVA: The top UN human rights official called on Syria on Friday to halt its ”assault on its own people” and said more than 1,100 people may have been killed and up to 10,000 detained since March.
Navi Pillay, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged Damascus to allow a fact-finding mission into the country to investigate all allegations, including Syrian state television reports that 120 members of the security forces were killed by armed gangs.
”It is utterly deplorable for any government to attempt to bludgeon its population into submission, using tanks, artillery and snipers,” she said in a statement.
”I urge the government to halt this assault on its own people’s most fundamental human rights.”
More than 1,000 people have been killed in three months of popular unrest in Syria, human rights groups say. Yesterday, Britain, France, Germany and Portugal handed the UN Security Council a draft resolution condemning Syria’s crackdown on protesters, despite the risk of a Russia veto.
”We are receiving an increasing number of alarming reports pointing to the Syrian government’s continuing efforts to ruthlessly crush civilian protests,” said Pillay, a former UN war crimes judge. (PTI)
