DAMASCUS: Supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are to hold mass rallies Tuesday to counter a wave of deadly dissent that has prompted the announcement of an end to 50 years of emergency rule.
"Marches in support of President Assad and the country will be held on Tuesday in every province," state television director Rim Hadad said. The announcement followed a pledge by the authorities to lift the state of emergency in force since the ruling Baath party took power in 1963, sparked by two weeks of increasingly violent protests. Assad, who is facing an unprecedented wave of dissent at home, is expected to address his people in the days to come and announce a string of reforms. In the first such move since 1963, parliamentarians observed a moment of silence Sunday night to honour the victims of two weeks of protests in Syria, which activists say have left more than 130 people dead. An official toll puts the number at some 30 victims. The southern governorate of Daraa, a tribal area at the Jordanian border, has sustained most of the casualties, with violence surfacing in the northern city of Latakia in recent days. Eyewitnesses in Daraa said security forces had been sent back into the city in force on Monday after having withdrawn Saturday, and were positioned around the Omari mosque, site of deadly fights between protesters and troops last week. The streets of Latakia, a religiously diverse city 350 kilometres (220 miles) northwest of Damascus, on Monday were completely deserted, after 15 people were killed over the past three days alone, according to official figures. Funerals for a number of the victims of deadly shootings in the northern city, some believed to be the work of snipers, were held Monday as schools and businesses closed their doors, residents reached by telephone said. The security situation in the country has worsened in recent days, with reports of gangs wreaking havoc in Latakia, home to some 450,000 people, and sporadic bouts of violence in Daraa. France on Monday warned its citizens against travelling to the two cities. London-based rights group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights meanwhile reported five lawyers had been arrested, after the state released dozens of activists and detainees in an overture to protest movements. Buthaina Shaaban, a top adviser to Assad, on Sunday told AFP authorities had decided to end the state of emergency, which came into effect when the ruling Baath party rose to power almost 50 years ago. But it remains unclear what the decision will entail.
Syria's emergency law imposes restrictions on public gatherings and movements. It also authorises the interrogation of any individual and the surveillance of personal communications as well as official control of the content of newspapers and other media before publication. Shaaban said fundamentalists and Palestinian refugees from a camp near Latakia aimed to fuel sectarian strife in the city, which is home to Christians, Sunni Muslims and Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
"The Muslim Brothers never forgave, and they want to do it again. But they will fail again," Shaaban said.
"I think they used what happened in Tunisia and Egypt to say that this is the same thing," she added. "But it's not the same thing." Assad's father, late president Hafez al-Assad, dealt harshly with domestic opposition. In 1982, Hafez al-Assad clamped down on Islamists in the town of Hama, where tens of thousands of people were killed in army bombardments on the Muslim Brotherhood. The authorities have also accused "armed gangs" and extremist Muslims of pushing peaceful rallies in Daraa into violence.
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