• Wednesday, March 14, 2012
• Inter Press Service

The Syrian military has placed anti-personnel mines along its borders with Turkey and Lebanon, which have provided asylum for a large number of civilians fleeing the crackdown on year- long pro-democracy uprisings there, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).

Citing firsthand accounts from Syrian residents who witnessed troops laying the mines last week, Steven Goose, arms division director for the Washington-based HRW, strongly denounced the latest move by Bashar al-Assad's government to quell resistance and prevent a mass exodus of Syrian citizens.

Anti-personal mines are notorious for civilian deaths and are considered to be ineffective tactical weapons. 'Any use of antipersonnel landmines is unconscionable…There is absolutely no justification for the use of these indiscriminate weapons by any country, anywhere, for any purpose,' Goose said in a press release Tuesday.

Syria is not a party to the 159-nation strong 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, which 'comprehensively prohibits the use, production, trade, and stockpiling of antipersonnel mines.' '(There is) only one reason why Syria would want to plant anti- personnel landmines at its borders: to murder civilians trying to escape it. Truly horrific,' U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice tweeted on Tuesday.

The landmines appear to be the latest in a series of deadly tactics used by the Syrian government to prevent civilians from escaping. Over past weeks, several human rights groups, including Refugees International, have documented Syrian troops shooting civilians trying to flee besieged cities in Syria. The U.N. estimates that nearly 230,000 people have been displaced since the uprisings began last year, with close to 30,000 having already fled to Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon.

The findings come as Western nations continue to grapple with the best policy approach toward ending the hostilities and providing aid for Syria's most devastated populations — a task made more difficult by the contrasting political and strategic alignments of U.N. Security Council member states. After Russia and China vetoed a Security Council resolution late last year that would have signaled a clear, unified message demanding that Assad stop the violence, step down, and work toward a peaceful transition, U.S. officials have ratcheted up diplomatic pressure to secure a binding resolution.

Last week, calls for a U.S.-led military intervention in Syria intensified after Senator John McCain advocat ed air-strikes to precipitate a toppling of Assad's government. 'Providing military assistance to the Free Syrian Army and other opposition groups is necessary, but at this late hour, that alone will not be sufficient to stop the slaughter and save innocent lives. The only realistic way to do so is with foreign air power,' McCain told lawmakers on the Senate floor last week. Senior U.S. military officials remain sceptical about the feasibility of an aerial bombardment.

In congressional testimony last week, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey said that the size of Syria's conventional forces, its extensive, Russian-supplied anti-aircraft defence network, and its stockpile of chemical and biological weapons — one of the largest in the world — should all be cause for concern if policymakers decide to intervene.

Although the Barack Obama administration remains committed to a multilateral approach, in which any intervention would be predicated on international consensus, U.S. Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta said during the same Senate hearing last week that he had been instructed to draw up preliminary plans for strike, even as diplomatic negotiations continued.

During a U.N. Security Council meeting Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the she 'took note' of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavorov's call for a peaceful solution and an end to the violence. However, in a veiled denunciation of Russia's intransigence at the U.N., she stated that the growing death toll in Syria should be met, rhetorically at the very least, with firm resistance from the international community.

© Inter Press Service (2012) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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