UN council pressures Syria to follow deadline for peace

Violence across the country has left at least 170 people dead so far this week A UN Security Council statement is to step up the pressure on Syria by ordering it to comply with an April 10 deadline to halt fighting and withdraw its forces from Syrian population centres as regime forces pressed a crackdown on rebel bastions despite a truce pledge.
The so-called “presidential statement”, drafted by the US in cooperation with Britain, France and Germany, endorsing the timeline for ending a year-long conflict in Syria that has killed thousands, could be adopted by the 15-nation panel on Thursday assuming Western powers have Russia’s and China’s support, UN diplomats said according to Reuters.
“The Security Council demands that the Syrian government immediately and verifiably implement its commitments ... to (a) cease troop movements towards population centers, (b) cease all use of heavy weapons in such centers, and (c) begin pullback of military concentrations in and around population centers ... by 10 April 2012,” said the draft statement.
UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan told the council on Monday that the Syrian government had accepted the deadline, adding that he would push for an end of rebel operations within 48 hours after the government stops fighting and pulls its forces back. Annan urged the council to support the deadline.
The statement asks Annan to continue to update the council on Syria’s compliance with the deadline and progress towards implementing his six-point peace plan, which calls for an end to violence and dialogue between the government and opposition on a “political transition” for the country.
The draft would also have the council ask Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to present proposals for a ceasefire monitoring mission to monitor compliance with any future truce.
Syrian forces attacked several opposition bastions despite a ceasefire pledge, according to activist reports, as Russia said the opposition would never defeat Assad\'s army even if \"armed to the teeth\".
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said troops began shelling several towns and villages early on Wednesday.
\"From the Turkish border in the northeast to Daraa in the south, military operations are ongoing,\" Rami Abdel Rahman of the Britain-based group, told the AFP news agency.
\"Tanks are still shelling or storming towns and villages before going back to their bases.\"
Two separate explosions also rocked areas in and around the capital Damascus, killing at least seven people and causing damage to buildings.
Opposition activists said at least 15 people were killed in the explosion.
Sergei Lavrov, Russia\'s foreign minister, said on Wednesday that under-equipped rebels would never be able to defeat Syria\'s military, and warned of \"carnage\" for years to come if the violence continued.
\"It is clear as day that even if the Syrian opposition is armed to the teeth, it will not be able to defeat the government\'s army,\" the Interfax news agency quoted Lavrov as saying while on a visit to the former Soviet nation of Azerbaijan.
\"Instead, there will be carnage that lasts many, many years - mutual destruction.\"
Lavrov said that two groups of Syrian opposition representatives would visit Moscow in the coming days and that Russia would be using the meetings to convince them that it wants to help resolve the year-long crisis.
As part of Annan’s peace plan, the UN peacekeeping department is planning for a ceasefire monitoring mission that would have 200 to 250 unarmed observers. It would require a Security Council resolution.
Security Council statements need to be approved unanimously. It was not immediately clear what Russia’s position on the draft statement was, though Moscow has already said it backed the April 10 deadline and has urged Damascus to take the first step towards ending the fighting between the army and opposition.
Separately, Annan will brief the 193-nation UN General Assembly on Thursday at 10am (1400 GMT) on the situation in Syria via video link, an assembly spokesperson said.
Syria has publicly accepted the deadline, but Western diplomats have expressed scepticism about Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s intentions. They said it was doubtful he would fully comply with the deadline since he has broken all previous promises to halt to military action against civilian protesters.
But Damascus’ staunch ally Russia, which is key to the success or failure of Annan’s peace plan, has grown increasingly frustrated with Assad and is pressuring him to end the fighting, UN envoys say.
Washington on Wednesday voiced doubts that Assad would comply with a peace plan deadline, criticising an “intensification” of violence against opponents.
A senior Norwegian UN peacekeeper, meanwhile, flew into Damascus on Thursday to try to broker an agreement that will allow observers to be deployed across Syria to monitor the proposed ceasefire.
Opposition activists on Wednesday reported no let-up in Assad’s crackdown on what began over a year ago as a peaceful uprising and has since turned at least partly into an armed insurgency.
Human rights group Amnesty International said it had counted 232 deaths since Syria accepted Annan\'s plan on March 27.
Annan has ordered Norwegian Major-General Robert Mood, who served as head of mission of UNTSO, the UN peacekeeping operation in the Middle East, to take an advance team to Damascus anyway.
Mood’s job is to prepare the ground for an observer mission comprising up to 250 unarmed staff, his spokesman Ahmed Fawzi said. Such a mission would require a Security Council resolution before deploying.
Assad’s government issued its latest official death toll for the 12-month uprising. It told the United Nations that 6,044 people had been killed, of whom 2,566 were soldiers and police.
The United Nations itself says Assad\'s forces have killed more than 9,000 people in the past year.
Accounts of the violence could not be verified because Syria’s government restricts access to independent journalists.