Lucy Clarke-Billings and Gabriela Pomeroy
BBC News
Syria’s leader Ahmed al-Sharaa has vowed to hold anyone involved in harming civilians accountable after days of clashes where Syrian security forces allegedly killed hundreds of civilians from the Alawite religious minority.
A UK-based monitor said 830 civilians were killed in “massacres” targeting Alawites on the west coast on Friday and Saturday.
The BBC has been unable to independently verify the death toll of the violence, which is believed to be the worst since the fall of the Assad regime.
In a speech broadcast on national TV and posted on social media, Sharaa, whose rebel movement toppled Bashar al-Assad in December, also promised to hunt down Assad loyalists.
The fighting has also killed 231 members of the security forces and 250 pro-Assad fighters, according to the monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), taking the overall death toll to 1,311.
“Today, as we stand at this critical moment, we find ourselves facing a new danger – attempts by remnants of the former regime and their foreign backers to incite new strife and drag our country into a civil war, aiming to divide it and destroy its unity and stability,” the interim president said on Sunday.
“We affirm that we will hold accountable, firmly and without leniency, anyone who is involved in the bloodshed of civilians or harming our people, who overstepped the powers of the state or exploits authority to achieve his own ends,” Sharaa added in the video speech, posted by state news agency Sana.
“No-one will be above the law and anyone whose hands are stained with the blood of Syrians will face justice sooner rather
Read More