adminActivists say more than 27 000 people have been killed in the 18-month-old uprising against Assad, which started as a mainly peaceful street campaign for reform but has become a bloody insurgency that is deepening sectarian rifts in the Middle East.
“This crisis is deteriorating and represents a danger to the Syrian people, to the region, and to the whole world,” Brahimi said in Damascus after speaking with Assad for an hour at the presidential palace.
It was the veteran Algerian diplomat’s first meeting with the Syrian leader since he replaced Kofi Annan as mediator two weeks ago, taking on a mission that he described as “nearly impossible”.
Assad’s forces and the out-gunned but increasingly effective rebel fighters seeking his overthrow have ignored appeals to end the conflict, which continues to affect most of Syria’s main cities, including Damascus, Aleppo, Homs and Deir al-Zor.
Damascus residents reported hearing heavy overnight bombardment followed by the sound of jet planes swooping over the capital shortly after 7am on Saturday.
One resident, who asked to remain anonymous, said black smoke was rising from the southern Damascus neighbourhood of Hajar al-Aswad on Saturday afternoon, just days after Assad’s forces drove rebels out of the nearby district of Tadamon. — Reuters
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