U.S. condemns escalation of violence in Syria
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Xinhua, December 28, 2011
The U.S. government on Tuesday condemned the escalation of violence in Syria, accusing the Syrian government of disobeying the peace accord reached with the Arab League (AL).
"It was a horrible situation where the violence spiked over the course of several days. We obviously condemn this escalation of violence," State Department spokesman Mark Toner said at a briefing.
He accused the Syrian government of escalating their attacks on several neighborhoods in Homs in western Syrian and other cities before the deployment of AL observers.
"These actions are not consistent with the terms of the Arab League initiative that the Syrian regime agreed to on Nov. 2 or the protocol on observers that the regime agreed to on Dec. 19," Toner said.
He also urged the Syrian government to give AL observers "full access" to the Syrian people in order to carry out their mission and find out the truth.
According to the Cairo-based AL operation room, the first batch of AL observers, led by Sudanese General Mohammed Ahmed Mostafa al- Dabi, arrived in the restive Syrian city of Homs earlier on Tuesday and had already started their job.
Syria signed the AL observer protocol on Dec. 19 in the Egyptian capital of Cairo after the regional bloc threatened to submit the issue to the United Nations Security Council.
The Syrian government said Thursday that a total of 2,000 army and security personnel were killed during the nine-month-old unrest. However, the United Nations said more than 5,000 Syrians have been killed.
