Syrian forces stepped up raids across the country to arrest activists on Sunday after one of the bloodiest weeks in the six-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, residents and activists said.
Dozens of people were seized in house-to-house raids in the eastern tribal province of Deir al-Zor, in the southern Hauran Plain and in villages around the city of Hama, which was among the hardest hit by armoured assaults on protest flashpoints.
A lawyer from the southern city of Deraa, the cradle of the revolt against 41 years of Assad family rule, said he saw dozens of troops encircling the nearby village of Yadouda.
"I saw them by accident and fled. I heard that they later went into houses. They can come at any minute and raid and arrest," the lawyer, who asked not to be named, said by phone.
He said detainees could expect ill-treatment or worse. "You either disappear and are never heard from again, come back red and blue with holes in your body from beatings and torture to make an example of you or simply return in a coffin."
Syrian authorities do not comment on arrests or allegations of torture but have said in the past that any arrests are made in accordance with the constitution. They say they are fighting armed gangs who have killed at least 500 security personnel.
The United Nations says 2,200 people have died in the uprising that erupted in mid-March, while a Syrian grassroots organisation says security forces have killed 3,000 civilians.
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