Damascus blames massacre on ‘armed groups’

Lebanese protestors, calling for the release of the Shiite pilgrims Syria said Thursday, that a preliminary investigation showed that anti-government armed groups committed a massacre last week in Houla, in which 108 people were killed, with the aim of encouraging foreign military intervention against the Syrian government.
The Syrian explanation was slammed by Washington as a “blatant lie”, and a newspaper report pointed out that the  shoes worn by the attackers might give a clue as to their identity.
Meanwhile, as many as 63 people have been killed by gunfire from Syrian forces on Thursday, the news agency Al-Arabiya reported, citing Syrian activists of the Local Coordination Committees.
Brigadier General, Qassem Jamal Suleiman, head of the investigations committee formed by the government, said the victims were families “who refused to oppose the government and were at odds with the armed groups”.
He said many of the victims were relatives of a member of the Syrian parliament, according to Reuters.
There are five army posts in Houla, and the aim of the operation was to “eliminate the presence of the government totally and turn it into a region out of government control,” Jamaleddine told a press conference in Damascus.
“Our reaction to the Syrian characterisation of what transpired in Houla, I think quite simply it’s another blatant lie,” US ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice said.
UN monitors said that some of the victims in al-Houla, which included 49 children and 34 women, had been killed by shelling, but that most had been summarily executed.
“Killing children does not meet any goal of the government but those of the armed groups,” the general said.
He insisted that regular troops did not enter the area before or after attack, according to AFP.
“During clashes between troops and armed terrorist groups, the regular troops did not leave their positions but defended themselves, from their positions.”
Meanwhile, a report published by the Financial Times Thursday, said that the men who stormed one of the houses in Houla were dressed like soldiers except for the fact that “they wore white shoes,” according to a 10-year-old witness.
According to the newspaper report, the boy was hidden in a nearby barn as he watched the thugs leaving the house after shooting dead his 13-year-old friend, who was standing across the street.
The newspaper report cited Nadim Houry, of Human Rights Watch, as saying the running shoes were one of the details mentioned by witnesses as evidence that the people who carried out the attacks were not soldiers, but members of the much-feared ‘shabbiha’.
“With the regime basically relinquishing control over some rural areas, it’s easier to send in the ‘shabbiha’ than it is to send in the regular army,” Emile Hokayem, an analyst at the International Institute of Strategic Studies, said, according to the Financial Times . “They are a better tool for retribution, and you are going to see them operating in the country a lot more”.
The mass killing in Houla has produced symbolic responses, such as the ejection of top Syrian diplomats from Western capitals.
According to UN estimates, most of the victims died in their homes and entire families were summarily executed by gunmen at close range, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said, citing witnesses and survivors.
The UN, said pro-government ‘shabbiha’ were responsible for the slaughter, a version supported by the US and European nations on the Security Council.
UN peacekeeping chief, Herve Ladsous has said there was a “strong suspicion that the ‘shabbiha’ were involved in this tragedy in al-Houla,” referring to a militia loyal to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.
Assad’s ally Russia, continues to say the circumstances remain unclear and it is waiting for an investigation to be completed.
Russia routinely brings up the spectre of al-Qaeda to deflect responsibility for violence from forces loyal to Assad, as well as warning against the risk of outside military intervention every time Western powers suggest further steps to challenge Assad’s non-compliance.
Meanwhile in other developments, a previously unknown armed group calling itself the "Syrian Revolutionaries - Aleppo Province" said on Thursday that it is holding a group of Lebanese Shiite pilgrims who went missing last week.
"The kidnapped Lebanese are being looked after by us and are in good health," the group said in a statement received by Qatar-based satellite news channel Al-Jazeera.
"Negotiations for their release are possible as soon as Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah apologises.Our problem is not with any particular community but with those who assist in the suppression of the uprising", it added, in allusion to the 15-month revolt against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The Shiite militant group, which is the leading force in the current ruling coalition in Beirut, has close relations with Assad's regime and its Iranian ally.
Al-Jazeera showed images of men said to be among the kidnapped victims as well as passports.
Since the dozen or so returning pilgrims went missing on May 22, in the northern Syrian province of Aleppo, Nasrallah has called for restraint and urged his followers to refrain from sectarian revenge attacks against Syrian Sunnis.
On Sunday, the outgoing head of the opposition Syrian National Council, Burhan Ghalioun, said the pilgrims were still being held in Syria after reports, later denied, that they had resurfaced in Turkey.
"We spoke with some parties who had contacts with the group and we offered our assistance to have them freed," Ghalioun said.
But the mainstream rebel Free Syrian Army, which has close links with the SNC, has denied any involvement in the kidnapping.
Leaders of the kidnappers quoted by Al-Jazeera, said five of the men being held had admitted to being "officers" in Hezbollah, some of them "implicated in massacres" in Syria.
Nasrallah had said in a speech addressed to the kidnappers that his party would not change its position concerning the conflict in neighbouring Syria, declaring: "If this kidnapping is aimed at putting pressure on our political position, it's a waste of time."