AMMAN: Syrian forces raided houses in Hama for the second day on Thursday, residents said, hours after the city’s attorney general declared on YouTube he had resigned in protest against the suppression of street demonstrations.
Five months of protests have failed to unseat President Bashar al-Assad, who inherited power from his father and retains the loyalty of the core of his armed forces comprised mostly of members of the Alawite minority, the same sect as the president.
But demonstrators have been encouraged by the fall of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi and rising international pressure on Syria, including a planned European Union embargo on the oil industry which would disrupt a vital source of income.
Residents of Hama said security police and state militiamen, known as shabbiha, raided houses overnight in the al-Sabouniya and al-Marabet districts, after troops backed by tanks arrested dozens in two other neighbourhoods of the city the night before.
Syrian forces mounted a 10-day operation in the city at the beginning of August and arrested hundreds of people.
The attorney-general of Hama said he had resigned because security forces killed 72 jailed protesters and activists at Hama’s central jail on the eve of the military assault on the city on July 31. He said at least another 420 people were killed in the operation and were buried in mass graves in public parks.
An independent lawyer said the person in the video was Bakkour, who also denied reports by state media that he had been kidnapped by armed groups this week. (UNI)