Bahrain opposition defies ban on meeting diplomats

September 20, 2013

MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — Bahrain's main Shiite opposition group is defying a ban by the island's Sunni government to have direct contacts with foreign diplomats.

Al Wefaq's secretary-general, Sheik Ali Salman, met Norwegian political affairs envoy Hakon Smedsvig on Thursday in the Bahraini capital, Manama. Bahrain's Western-backed monarchy earlier this month banned all diplomatic contacts by political groups unless they receive official permission. The move was sharply criticized by Western governments, including the U.S.

This week, authorities detained a top Al Wefaq official on allegations of inciting violence. In return, the group announced a boycott of reconciliation talks with the government. The strategic Gulf nation has been gripped by unrest since an uprising launched in early 2011 by majority seeking a greater political voice.

U.S. State Department deputy spokesperson Marie Harf said in a statement that in the last two years the Bahraini government and oppositions groups have been involved in important dialogue but that recent developments have hindered the process.

"The Government of Bahrain has recently issued decrees restricting the rights and abilities of political groups to assemble, associate, and express themselves freely, including by regulating their communications with foreign governments and international organizations," the statement said.

Bahrain opposition boycotts talks after detention

September 18, 2013

MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — Bahrain's main Shiite groups suspended participation in reconciliation talks with the Sunni-led government Wednesday after the detention of a top opposition figure in the violence-wracked Gulf nation.

The decision deepens the showdown over Khalil al-Marzooq, a former deputy parliament speaker, who is under investigation for allegedly encouraging anti-government violence. His supporters claim he was targeted by Bahrain's Western-backed authorities in attempts to punish the opposition after recent criticism from European officials about government crackdowns on dissent.

Repeated rounds of political talks have failed to significantly close the rifts between the Sunni establishment and Shiite factions, which began an Arab Spring-inspired uprising in early 2011 to seek greater political rights. More than 65 people have died in the unrest, but rights groups and others place the death toll higher.

The snub by the Shiite groups closes one of the main channels for dialogue and could sharply escalate tensions in the strategic kingdom, home to the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet. A government statement quoted Nayef Yousif, head of Bahrain's public prosecution, as saying al-Marzooq is accused of instigating violence and having links to a protest faction that authorities blame for bombings and other attacks. Al-Marzooq, who was detained Tuesday, was ordered held for 30 days during the investigation.

Al-Marzooq is a top member of Al Wefaq, the main political bloc of Bahrain's Shiite majority. In Washington, State Department deputy spokeswoman Marie Harf said Wednesday that the U.S. would raise the issue with Bahraini authorities as part of its discussion of recent political events in Bahrain.

"We are disappointed that opposition groups have suspended their involvement. I think it's an important forum. We would hope that everybody would be part of that process," Harf said. Also Wednesday, Bahrain's public security chief, Maj. Gen. Tariq Hassan al-Hassan, said a policeman died of injuries suffered in a bomb blast last month.

Land confiscation sparks conflict between Arabs and Iranian security services

Thursday, September 12, 2013

At least 11 Ahwazi Arabs were arrested in clashes between locals and the security forces as they evicted and destroyed Arab farms in Sheyban, Bawi county this month, according to activist reports.

Defying local community opposition, the government ordered in bulldozers to destroy farms that had been owned by Arabs for hundreds of years. The move was brought about as an ethnic Persian woman made a claim on 35 hectares of farmland whose Arab owners, the Zeheri family, state has been in their possession for many generations.

The following members of the Zeheri family were arrested by the Security Services: Adel, Hadi, Adib, Amin Aataiee (Zeheri), Ali Hassan, Jawad, Hamid Jasem, Jaafar son of Aabiyd.

Land confiscation is carried out by the regime for the sake of establishing sugar cane plantations, fish farms, an industrial free trade zone and more military sites for the Revolutionary Guards. Arabs subject to government land confiscation are never given the true value of their land in compensation and often receive no payment and are left destitute and landless, according to former UN housing specialist Miloon Kothari after his visit to Iran in 2005.

Source: Ahwaz News Agency.
Link: http://www.ahwaziarabs.info/2013/09/land-confiscation-sparks-conflict.html.

Retired Arab teacher humiliates Iranian President

Monday, August 26, 2013

President Hassan Rouhani was left humiliated and embarrassed after an elderly Ahwazi Arab publicly castigated the Iranian government for systemically ignoring his community's long-standing appeals for jobs, education, clean water and human rights.

In a daring display of defiance in front of television cameras and a public audience, retired teacher Haj Ghasem Hamadi of Khafajyeh [correction: in the previous version of this report, the man was wrongly identified as a religious sheikh] lambasted the Iranian regime's indifference to the plight of Ahwazi Arabs during a presidential visit to a local mosque. Rouhani was left speechless and the man was interrupted by a presidential aide.

Hamadi said: "In terms of agriculture, there is no water only salty water, no irrigation, no fertilizers and no seeds. They provide 20 bags of compost per hectares for Dezful, but we are given one per hectare. In terms of agriculture everything is below par. In terms of facilities in the area also is below par.

"We have got problems in education. Our situation is bad. No one asks about our hardship. Everyone who comes from there [from Tehran] says hello and goodbye. That is all."

Rouhani asked: “You mean there is nothing?”

The man answered: “There is not anything. You are in Tehran, you don’t know this region is deprived. There is no farming, no reconstruction, no water, no prosperity, no one asks about us, you are in Tehran, shouldn’t you ask about the deprived regions? We have the oil, the water, the land but we are dying from hunger!"

President Rouhani created high expectations among Ahwazi Arabs and other ethnic groups after he promised to end discrimination and enforce linguistic rights during his election campaign.

Rouhani attempted to win over several Arab sheikhs who were invited to meet him in Tehran and voice their concerns. At the meeting, he appeared to accede to their demands for a 10 per cent share of cabinet seats for members of the Arab minority. However, he has failed to appoint any Arabs to ministerial positions.

Hailing from the north of Iran, the 'pragmatic conservative' sought to attract non-Persian vote with a list of 10 pledges to address ethnic discrimination, in accordance with neglected constitutional provisions. These included the right to learn in the native tongue, as stated in Article 15, and promoting a meritocratic economy based not on ethnicity or religion but personal strengths in order to leverage the best local human resources. Rouhani has also promised to promote local people into managerial positions.

The president has failed to address some of the more urgent development issues that concern ordinary Ahwazi Arabs who feel increasingly estranged from their co-opted tribal leaders, namely the region's man-made environmental crisis and political issues. Rouhani's failure to engage with ordinary Arab workers and farmers indicates that his administration will continue to seek to use political and financial patronage to win the allegiance of tribal elites with little attempt to engage with the masses.

Source: Ahwaz News Agency.
Link: http://www.ahwaziarabs.info/2013/08/arab-sheikh-humiliates-iranian-president.html.

Top Assad's spy general neutralized by Mujahideen

17 October 2013

Mujahideen neutralized a top army gen. Jamaa Jamaa on Thursday while on dog's duty in eastern Syria.

Major general Jamaa Jamaa was successfully eliminated while pursuing Mujahideen in Deir al-Zour.

Jamaa, who was the head of the enemy military intelligence directorate in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour, was one of the most powerful Assad's army thugs in the country.

Ayesha bint al-Sadiq Brigade said it was behind Jamaa's targeted neutralization. Mujahideen in Dier al-Zour fired celebratory gunfire after hearing of Jamaa's elimination.

In despair, the bloody Alawite regime intensified its shelling on the eastern province soon after announcing Jamaa's neutralization.

The city of Deir el-Zour has witnessed clashes between courageous Mujahideen and cowardly Alawite troops for more than a year.

Source: Agencies
Kavkaz Center

Source: Kavkaz Center.
Link: http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2013/10/17/18408.shtml.

Ahwazis unite against Iran's dam project

Saturday, October 19, 2013

The drying of the River Karoun is becoming a rallying point for Ahwazi Arabs, who have accused the Iranian regime of presiding over an ecological disaster on a par with the destruction of the Amazon.

Environmental campaigners in Ahwaz City formed a human chain along the Karoun this week in protest at the river diversion project. The mega-project involves the construction of dams and tunnels to divert water away from Iran's largest river which flows through the city and is essential for farming, drinking water and the local ecology.

Controversy surrounds the Koohrang-3 tunnel, which is currently under construction and is set to transfer 255 million cubic meters of water per annum to Zayandeh Rood in Isfahan. The diverted waters will be used for agro-industrial projects, instead of irrigating traditional Arab lands where food staples are grown, such as rice and wheat. Already, three tunnels transfer around 1.1 billion cubic meters of water from the Karoun and its tributaries to Isfahan every year.

Currently, there are seven dams and tunnels diverting Karoun's water with a further 19 dams under construction as well as 12 dams on Karkheh river basin and five dams on Jarrahi river basin. Twelve of these dams have built in Lorestan province in the Karoun and Karkheh basins, which store 800 million cubic meters for local use. Two dams have built in Ilam province on Karkheh river basin with annual storage capacity 1.04 billion cubic meters. Three dams have been built in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province on Jarrahi River with annual capacity of 1.24 billion cubic meters. So far, 25 dams with total capacity of 10.44 billion cubic meters have into operation in the Karoun basin. These dams are located in Chahar Mahaal and Bakhtiari province, Lorestan province and the north part of Al-Ahwaz (Khuzestan).

Due to the dam projects, around half the Karoun's water flow is now waste water. This will reach 90 per cent when Iran's dam building project is completed, according to Iranian scientists. The Karkheh and Jarrahi tributaries are now almost dried up and Ahwazi activists fear the Karoun - Iran's only navigable river - will now dry up. Already, the region's marshlands on which many Ahwazi Arabs traditionally depend for their livelihoods are a fraction of their former size due to the dam projects.

One of the groups campaigning against the destruction of the Karoun, the Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz (PADMAZ), has claimed that as a result of the dam projects "the Ahwazi environment will be destroyed and Ahwazi Arab will be forced to move to other cities in addition to contracting intestinal and renal diseases and different kinds of cancer... This will speed up the Iranian colonial plan of ethnic cleansing of Ahwazi Arabs."

Source: Ahwaz News Agency.
Link: http://www.ahwaziarabs.info/2013/10/Save-Karoun-001.html.

Blast in southern Syria kills 21, activists say

October 16, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — An explosion struck a vehicle packed with passengers traveling in southern Syria overnight, killing at least 21 people, including four children, activists said Wednesday.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the blast hit the vehicle around midnight as it was driving near Tel al-Juma in Daraa province. Six women were also among the dead, it added.

It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion, nor why a group of women and children were traveling in dangerous and disputed territory in the middle of the night. The Observatory said local activists accuse government troops, who are stationed at an army outpost in the area besieged by rebels, of planting explosives by the roadside.

Daraa was the birthplace of the Syrian uprising against President Bashar Assad in March 2011.

Group: Syrian regime shelling kills 11 in south

October 13, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — Tank shells fired by Syrian government forces slammed into a building in a southern city, killing at least 11 people there, including women and children, activists said Sunday.

The attack was part of the latest push by President Bashar Assad's troops to recapture land lost to rebels in the southern province and city of Daraa, the birthplace of Syria's uprising. It was there in 2011 that several youths were arrested for scrawling graffiti calling for Assad's downfall.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists on the ground, said at least four women and three children, including a baby, were among those killed in the attack late Saturday.

Syria's official news agency said that rebels fired mortars toward a government building in Daraa, but offered no further details. Videos posted on social networking sites by opposition activists showed bodies of the victims on the floor of a darkened room.

"Oh God, what a disaster!" weeps an elderly woman in the video as a man holds the body of a dead baby, wrapped in a sheet. The bodies of a young girl with short curly hair and a boy lie nearby. The video was consistent with Associated Press reporting of the incident.

A pro-rebel activist in a nearby town, who identified himself as Abu Musab, said the civilians were killed in crossfire during a battle in the city center. The building they were in took a direct hit after Syrian forces fired tank shells toward rebels holed up near it, said Abu Musab, speaking to the AP on Skype. He declined to use his real name, citing concerns for his safety.

There have been frequent clashes in and around Daraa between Assad's forces and the mostly Sunni rebels. On Wednesday, rebels overran a military post near the city. Late last month they also captured a nearby military base that previously served as the customs office on the outskirts of Daraa.

Syrian uprising started as mostly peaceful anti-Assad demonstrations in March 2011, inspired by the Arab Spring. After activists were violently targeted, it morphed into an armed uprising and civil war. The conflict has killed over 100,000 people, forced over 2 million to flee to neighboring countries, and displaced another 5 million within Syria.

Hezbollah, Iraqi militia capture Damascus suburb: opposition

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
AMMAN | Wed Oct 9, 2013

(Reuters) - Iraqi and Lebanese Shi'ite militia backed by Syrian army firepower overran a southern suburb of Damascus on Wednesday, opposition activists said, in a blow to Sunni Muslim rebels trying to hold onto strategic outskirts of the capital.

At least 20 rebels were killed when Hezbollah guerrillas and Iraqi militiamen captured the town of Sheikh Omar under cover of Syrian army artillery and tank fire and aerial bombardment, the activists said, with tens of Shi'ite fighters killed or wounded.

Sheikh Omar sits between two highways leading south of Damascus that are crucial to supplying President Bashar al-Assad's forces in the provinces of Deraa and Sweida on the border with Jordan.

Syria's 2-1/2 year war has killed more than 120,000 people and forced millions from their homes into sprawling refugee camps in neighboring countries.

It began with peaceful demonstrations against four decades of iron rule by the Assad family. With regional powers backing opposing sides in the conflict and Russia blocking Western efforts to force Assad aside, there is little sign of an end to the bloodshed.

Regional security officials say up to 60,000 fighters from Iraq, Iran and Yemen and Hezbollah are present in Syria supporting Assad, whose Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.

The country has also seen the influx of 30,000 Sunni Muslim fighters to support the rebels, including foreign jihadists and Syrian expatriates.

Hezbollah has acknowledged fighting openly in support of Assad, its main patron together with Shi'ite Iran, but the group does not comment on the specifics of its operations in the country.

The deployment of the Iraqi and Lebanese militia has been vital in preventing all southern approaches to Damascus from falling into rebel hands, according to opposition sources and the regional security officials.

The foreign Shi'ite fighters together with soldiers and local paramilitaries loyal to Assad have been laying siege to rebel-held southern suburbs of the capital near the Shi'ite shrine of Saida Zainab for the past six months, residents say.

The siege has squeezed rebels in areas further to the center of the city and caused acute shortages of food and medicine that have hit the civilian population.

FLOOD OF WOUNDED

Wardan Abu Hassan, a doctor at a makeshift hospital in southern Damascus, said the facility and another nearby received 70 wounded people, both fighters and civilians, since 4.00 a.m.

The wounded came from Sheikh Omar and the nearby suburbs of al-Thiabiya and al-Boueida, where the rebels were trying to hold off the Shi'ite militia advance, he said.

"Most of the casualties are from air strikes, and fire from tanks and multiple rocket launchers," the physician told Reuters.

An opposition group, the Damascus Revolution Leadership Council, said a baby girl died on Wednesday in the southern district of Hajar al-Asswad from malnutrition caused by the siege. The report could not be independently confirmed.

Rami al-Sayyed from the opposition Syrian Media Center mentoring group said rebel fighters were trying to hold off the Hezbollah and Iraqi fighters in al-Thiabiya and al-Boueida.

"It is tough because the regime is providing Hezbollah and the Iraqis with heavy artillery and rocket cover from high ground," he said.

Sayyed said much of the fire was coming from the 56th army brigade in the hilly region of Sahya. That area was evacuated after the threat of U.S. strikes following a nerve gas attack in August on other rebellious Damascus suburbs that killed hundreds.

The area became operational again after the threat receded following a deal to destroy Assad's chemical weapons arsenal, Sayyed said.

Buoyed by the receding prospect of U.S. intervention, Assad has been seeking to tighten his grip on the center of the country, the coast, areas along the country's main north-south highway as well as the capital and its environs.

Large areas of southern Damascus, including the areas of Hajar al-Assad and the Yarmouk refugee camp, are inhabited by poor refugees from the Israeli occupied Golan Heights, who have been at the forefront of the revolt against Assad, as well as Palestinian refugees.

(Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

Source: Reuters.
Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/09/us-syria-crisis-damascus-idUSBRE9980XW20131009.

As Syrian refugee influx swells, so does backlash

October 09, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — Last year, as Syrian refugees were pouring in, signs started going up in Lebanese towns and villages imposing nighttime curfews and warning the newcomers to stay away. Some referred just to "foreign workers," others directly cited "Syrians."

The signs have since come down amid a campaign by human rights activists who rallied in Beirut this summer and hung a banner from a bridge in the capital saying: "Excuse us for the behavior of those who are racist among us."

But with more than a million refugees in a country of just 4.5 million, the tensions linger. Lebanon is the biggest recipient of Syrians fleeing the 2 1/2 -year civil war that has killed more than 100,000 people and displaced millions. Syrians are accused of committing burglaries, of cutting into the job market, even of causing traffic jams.

Judi, a 22-year-old student, describes being ordered out of a taxi when the driver learned she is Syrian. Majid, who works at a parking lot, says he has taken to hiding his nationality. Abed, a Beirut concierge, returned to Syria to spend Ramadan with family and when he tried to come back, an immigration officer banned him from entering for one year. No explanation was given, Abed said, speaking to The Associated Press by phone from Syria.

All three asked that their surnames be withheld because their situation is sensitive. Underlying the tensions is a historically fraught relationship. For much of the past 30 years, Syria all but ruled Lebanon. It dictated policies on everything, from the appointment of senior civil servants to the naming of presidents and prime ministers. It stationed tens of thousands of troops in the country, ran humiliating roadblocks and was blamed for scores of bombings and assassinations.

All that ended in 2005 with a Syrian withdrawal under international pressure. But the Syrian regime still has powerful allies here, including the militant Hezbollah group and an array of smaller, armed groups.

Many Lebanese have opened their homes to them, but Lama Fakih of Human Rights Watch said Syrian refugees tell the organization that they feel insecurity and growing hostility. She said female refugees are vulnerable to exploitation by landlords and employers. "We find that there are instances where women are being sexually harassed, are being asked to make sexual favors and when they refuse and resist, are concerned about being retaliated against."

Some politicians, including those from the nationalist Free Patriotic Movement led by Christian leader Michel Aoun, have called for closing the border to refugees. They say the influx could upset the country's delicate sectarian balance. Most of the refugees are Sunni Muslim, while Lebanon has large Shiite and Christian populations.

"What is happening is organized crime carried out by Lebanese and foreign officials to change the country's demography," said Gibran Bassil, outgoing energy minister and senior member of the Free Patriotic Movement.

The hostility has affected Syrians who, like Abed the concierge, have been in Lebanon for years. Majid, who was working at the parking lot long before Syria's crisis began, describes being cursed by a customer who caught his Syrian accent.

"I had expected him to give me a tip," he said. Instead, "I was humiliated but did not dare to respond."

Associated Press writer Yasmine Saker contributed to this report from Beirut.

Rebels attack army base in northern Syria

October 08, 2013

MAARET AL-NUMAN, Syria (AP) — Rebel fighters dressed in camouflage uniforms carefully loaded mortar rounds, then with a loud boom and a burst of smoke the shells zipped off in the direction of a nearby government army base.

"We are coming to get you, shabiha!" a man surrounded by rebel fighters shouted in an apparent reference to President Bashar Assad, using the term the opposition uses to refer to pro-government gunmen.

The shelling Tuesday, the latest salvo in an assault on the military facility, was part of a broader rebel effort to capture the remaining regime outposts in the largely opposition-held countryside of northern Syria.

Dramatic footage shot by The Associated Press showed a group of 45 young rebel fighters launching an attack on the military base, and others deploying improvised cannons and makeshift mortars. Some were also seen firing anti-aircraft weapons at attacking government helicopters.

The rebels captured the strategic city of Maaret al-Numan a year ago after systematically seizing the army's outposts in the area, a major supply route linking the capital, Damascus, with the contested Idlib region and Syria's largest city, Aleppo.

But despite repeated assaults on the nearby military installation of Hamidiyeh, in the Wadi Deif area east of the city, the rebel fighters have failed to break through the heavily fortified base. The latest operation began Monday, and the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said many Libyan fighters were battling on the rebel side. It said regime fighter jets twice hit opposition-held areas near the city Tuesday and the clashes caused casualties, though it gave no specifics.

At least 10 government soldiers and one rebel fighter were killed on Monday, it said. The fight for the base is part of the ongoing, broader struggle for control of northern Syria, where the opposition controls large swathes of territory captured from Assad's troops.

Most of the northern countryside is in the hands of anti-Assad fighters, while the government is holding out in isolated military bases and inside major cities. During the latest rebel assault Tuesday, one young rebel could be heard shouting above the mortar fire: "We are ready to move on our military operation, in order to remove the enemy check points and the army presence in Wadi Deif."

"God is great and he is the one who protects us." Meanwhile, at The Hague, the chief of the global chemical weapons watchdog briefed member states on progress in the high-stakes mission to rid Syria of its poison gas stockpile.

Ahmet Uzumcu, director-general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, spoke to the group's 41-nation Executive Council at the start of a four-day meeting as inspectors continued their mission.

Earlier Tuesday, teams of weapons inspectors were seen leaving their Damascus hotel in several U.N. vehicles. It was not clear where they were headed and what their task for the day was. On Sunday, Syrian personnel working under the supervision of the chemical weapons watchdog team began destroying the country's chemical arsenal and equipment used to produce it.

The mission to scrap Syria's chemical weapons program stems from a deadly Aug. 21 attack on opposition-held suburbs of Damascus in which the U.N. has determined the nerve agent sarin was used. Hundreds of people were killed, including many children. The U.S. and Western allies accuse the Syrian government of being responsible, while Damascus blames the rebels.

In neighboring Lebanon, meanwhile, the country's main security service announced the capture of three Lebanese and Syrian militants it said were planning assassinations and bomb attacks in Lebanon. Lebanon was hit by several explosions over the past weeks that killed scores of people.

Syrian rebel groups battle each other in north

October 04, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — Al-Qaida militants battled fighters linked to the Western-backed opposition along with Kurdish gunmen in Syrian towns along the Turkish border on Friday, in clashes that killed at least 19 people, activists said.

The violence is part of an outburst of infighting among the myriad rebel groups opposed to Syrian President Bashar Assad for control over prized border areas. Islamic extremist fighters and more mainstream rebels are increasingly turning their guns on each other in what has effectively become a war within a war in northern and eastern Syria, leaving hundreds dead on both sides.

Turkey has been a staunch supporter of the rebels seeking to topple Assad, and has allowed the flow of weapons, men and supplies through border crossings into Syria. In an interview with Turkey's private Halk TV, Assad said Turkey will pay a "high price" for allowing foreign fighters to enter Syria from its territory. "You cannot hide terrorists in your pocket. They are like a scorpion, which will eventually sting you," Assad added.

The interview, broadcast late Thursday, was the latest given by the Syrian president to foreign media as part of a charm offensive in the wake of the Russian-brokered deal that averted the threat of a U.S. airstrike over an August chemical weapons attack that killed hundreds of people.

Assad said it was still too early to say whether he'll run for re-election next year, but suggested he would refrain from seeking a third term — if he feels that is what most Syrians want him to do. He said "the picture will be clearer" in the next four to five months because Syria is going though "rapid" changes on the ground.

"If I have a feeling that the Syrian people want me to be president in the coming period, I will run for the post," Assad said. "If the answer is no, I will not run and I don't see a problem in that."

Assad has been president since 2000. He took over after the death of his father and predecessor, Hafez Assad, who ruled for three decades. Syria's opposition wants Assad to step down and hand over power to a transitional government until new elections are held.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department called it "really unfathomable" that Assad would even contemplate running again. "If he really were to follow the wishes of the Syrian people, he would go," Marie Harf said.

"This is a process that will take time," she added. "But I think the notion of a brutal dictator who's killed so many of his own people claiming to have any opportunity to run for additional elected office is really actually quite offensive."

The infighting between rebels and the increasingly domineering role played by foreign fighters in the civil war has played into the government's line that it is fighting extremists, not a popular uprising.

Activists said heavy fighting continued Friday in the town of Azaz near the Turkish border between al-Qaida militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and fighters linked to the Western-backed Free Syrian Army group.

An activist affiliated with Syrian rebels, who identified himself as Abu Raed, said one fighter from the Northern Storm brigade involved in the fighting against ISIL was killed in Azaz. It was unclear what the overall death toll was.

He said the infighting was leaving Syrian rebels clashing on two fronts. "The best solution is a peaceful one. Otherwise we will have a river of blood, from all of us. It won't end, and it won't stop," he said, speaking from near Azaz via Skype.

ISIL fighters also battled Kurdish forces around the town of Ras al-Ain in Syria's Kurdish-dominated north, said a Kurdish activist, Bassam al-Ahmed, in the nearby town of Hassakeh. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 14 fighters from ISIL and the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusra group and four Kurdish gunmen were killed.

In Damascus, a team of international weapons experts in Syria was out in the field on its fourth day of work in the country. Their mission — endorsed by a U.N. Security Council resolution last week — is to scrap Syria's capacity to manufacture chemical weapons by Nov. 1 and to destroy Assad's entire stockpile by mid-2014.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said Friday that Syria had submitted information about its program. Without elaborating in the statement late Friday, the Hague-based organization said its executive council would address the issue on Tuesday.

Associated Press writer Diaa Hadid in Beirut contributed to this report.

Syrian rebels capture post near Jordan border

September 28, 2013

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian rebels including members of an al-Qaida-linked group captured Saturday a military post on the border with Jordan after four days of fighting, an activist group said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 26 soldiers were killed in the battle as well as a number of rebels, including seven foreign fighters. The post served in the past as the customs office on the border with Jordan. It was turned into an army post years ago.  

The post is on the outskirts of the southern city of Daraa where the uprising against President Bashar Assad's regime began in March 2011. The uprising later turned into a civil war that killed more than 100,000 people, according to the U.N.

Rebels control multiple areas along the borders with Jordan, Iraq, Turkey and Lebanon as well as the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Also Saturday some U.N. inspectors left their hotel in Damascus in one vehicle to an unknown location, according to an Associated Press photographer at the scene.

The U.N. said Friday its team of weapons experts currently in Syria will investigate seven sites of alleged chemical attacks in the country, four more than previously known. The announcement came hours before the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to secure and destroy Syria's chemical weapons stockpile.

The team initially visited Syria last month to investigate three alleged chemical attacks this year. But just days into the visit, the rebel-held Damascus suburb of Ghouta was hit by a chemical strike, and the inspectors turned their attention to that case. The inquiry determined that the nerve agent sarin was used in the Aug. 21 attack, but it did not assess who was behind it.

The U.S. says more than 1,400 people were killed in the attack while activists gave a smaller number but still in the hundreds. The UN team of investigators expects to finalize its activities in the country by Monday, a U.N. statement said.

On Thursday, the world's chemical weapons watchdog adopted a U.S.-Russian plan that lays out benchmarks and timelines for cataloging, quarantining and ultimately destroying Syria's chemical weapons, their precursors and delivery systems.

The Security Council resolution enshrines the plan approved by Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, making it legally binding. The agreement allows the start of a mission to rid Syria's regime of its estimated 1,000-ton chemical arsenal by mid-2014, significantly accelerating a destruction timetable that often takes years to complete.

A draft of the OPCW decision obtained by The Associated Press calls for the first inspectors to be in Syria by Tuesday.

Buses in large-scale bridge protest in Portugal

October 19, 2013

LISBON, Portugal (AP) — Portuguese workers have protested the country's austerity measures by boarding dozens of buses and crisscrossing one of Lisbon's main bridges with their horns blaring.

Portugal's main labor group, the General Confederation of Portuguese Workers, organized Saturday's demonstration after authorities refused to allow the protesters to cross the 2.3-kilometer(1.4-mile)-long bridge on foot, citing safety concerns.

Trade unions are fighting pay and pension cuts and the scrapping of workers' rights — measures required by creditors in return for Portugal's 78-billion-euro ($100 billion) bailout in 2011. In a similar protest in April, buses decked with flags and blowing their horns crossed the same bridge over the River Tagus in long lines before the workers aboard staged a demonstration in the city.

Unions are planning more strikes in November.

Italy: protesters throw eggs at finance ministry

October 19, 2013

ROME (AP) — Anti-austerity protesters in Rome threw eggs and firecrackers at the Finance Ministry during a march Saturday to oppose cuts to welfare programs and a shortage in low-income housing. Police said 11 people were detained.

More than 4,000 riot police were dispatched to maintain order as some 25,000 protesters marched through the capital on Saturday. There were moments of tension when demonstrators passed near the headquarters of an extreme-right group, but police intervened when a few bottles were thrown.

Later, demonstrators threw eggs, firecrackers and smoke bombs outside the Finance Ministry. Police reacted by dispersing the protesters, detaining 11 of the demonstrators. There were no reports of injuries.

Ahead of the march police detained some anarchists believed to pose a security threat.

Thousands in Rome protest Italian austerity cuts

October 18, 2013

ROME (AP) — Thousands of workers are demonstrating in Rome against the Italian government's new budget, which they say will bring more hardship.

The protests were accompanied Friday by a 24-hour nationwide strike that caused disruptions for travelers. Train service was guaranteed in most cities for morning and evening commutes, but airports in Rome, Naples, Milan and Bologna had to cancel some flights. Some school and health workers also went on strike.

The USB and COBAS unions organized Friday's strike to protest austerity measures reducing transportation budgets. USB union coordinator Pierpaolo Leonardi accused the Italian government of imposing EU directives without concern for the impact on workers.

A smaller protest of about 600 workers was held in Milan.

Hollande: expelled 15-year-old can return, alone

October 19, 2013

PARIS (AP) — Under fire from the far left and members of his own party, Socialist President Francois Hollande said Saturday that a 15-year-old girl who was detained in front of her classmates and expelled as an illegal immigrant can return to France. But the rest of the family cannot come with her.

Leonarda Dibrani, however, said she would not return without her family, who are Roma, or Gypsies. The deportation of the Dibrani family, whose requests for asylum were rejected, has lit a firestorm in France, where such expulsions aren't rare but are always sensitive as the birthplace of the "rights of man" grapples with a flux of immigrants. It's an especially delicate issue for Hollande and the Socialists, who have tried to present a softer image of France's immigration policies and distance themselves from former Nicolas Sarkozy's tough stance.

The uproar began earlier this week when it became public that 15-year-old Leonarda was detained by police as she got off a bus from a school trip. Schools are considered places of sanctuary, and many thought that principle had been breached. The case has also opened a wider debate on France's immigration policies.

The story has since become more complicated, with the father admitting that he lied in his asylum application when he said the entire family fled Kosovo, where they were persecuted for being Roma. Leonarda, and most of her siblings, were born in Italy, though they do not have Italian citizenship.

A government report published Saturday found that the police followed the law, although the report said they didn't seem to realize the sensitivity of what they were doing. Apparently fearing that conclusion wouldn't put the issue to rest, Hollande went on national television Saturday to walk the line between maintaining a tough stance on illegal immigrants and showing compassion for girl caught up in the storm.

He said Leonarda, considering the circumstances of her detention, could come back to France to go to school, if she wishes. But only she can come back. In Mitrovica, Kosovo, where the family is now living, Leonarda told reporters she would not come back without her family.

"Mr. Hollande has no heart for my family? He has no pity?" Leonarda asked, in an emotional scene in front of cameras. Her father has threatened to return to France illegally and even said the family had already packed their bags.

"We thought that Hollande was a just person to protect a family," said Leonarda's mother, Dzemila Dibrani. "To give him my daughter, that is not possible." Hollande also said local authorities would be told that such detentions cannot happen while children are in the care of their schools, whether inside the building, at the exit, on a bus or in after-school activities.

Although polls show that the majority of French people don't think the family should be allowed to return to France, the case has threatened to destabilize the Hollande government. On Thursday and Friday, thousands of teenagers protested the expulsion, and students gathered again Saturday on the steps of the Opera house at Place de la Bastille. They are calling for French law to be changed so minors who are in school cannot be expelled, and their families can remain, too.

Qena reported from Mitrovica, Kosovo.

Iranian protesters outside US Embassy in Berlin

October 18, 2013

BERLIN (AP) — Iranian dissidents are demonstrating outside the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, pushing for action after the killing of 52 of their compatriots in Iraq.

A dozen Mujahedeen-e-Khalq members protested in front of the embassy Friday, next to the landmark Brandenburg Gate. The group accuses the Iranian and Iraqi governments of involvement in the Sept. 1 shooting at Camp Ashraf in which roughly half the camp's U.N.-protected population was killed. The dissidents claim seven MEK members are being held by Iraq.

Iraq denies any involvement, saying the killings were an internal dispute. The U.N. has investigated but hasn't determined who was responsible. The group, which is strongly opposed to Iran's clerical regime, has been protesting since early September, calling for international pressure on Iraq to get to the bottom of the killings.