Tripoli, Lebanon: When Syrian soldiers burst into the home of a man they suspected of sheltering revolutionary fighters, only to find that he was out, they turned on his wife and children instead.
The officer in command snatched up the youngest child, a boy of seven months, from the corner of the living room, where the family were cowering.
Then he laid him on the floor, pulled out his army knife and cut off the baby's head, according to a soldier from the army's 11th Armoured Division who claims to have witnessed the killing.
He hung the head above the front door they had kicked down and screamed that the same fate would befall the other children unless their father gave himself up, the soldier claims.
The story was told last week by Mohammad, a fresh-faced 22-year-old who declined to give his full name. He said he had retched at the sight of the child's murder in the northwestern town of Jisr Al Shughur during an army operation after the deaths of 120 members of the security forces last June.
"That was when I decided to defect," he said, tears rolling down his cheeks as he spoke at an opposition safe house in the Lebanese city of Tripoli. "I'll have to live with that memory for ever. We did things I never want to remember."
Evidence
His claims adds to mounting evidence that President Bashar Al Assad's forces have targeted opponents' children in their campaign to crush a revolt. Activists in Homs released a video recently that purported to show the body of a four-month-old girl. A large red mark could be seen on her back. The activists alleged she had been tortured and killed by security forces.
The claims of Mohammad and the activists cannot be corroborated because the regime does not allow most journalists to travel independently. But their accounts seem consistent with reports of atrocities compiled by the UN, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
The Sunday Times interviewed former soldiers, civilians and activists who have fled the violence for Tripoli.
One activist who was arrested for making protest banners in the town of Talkalakh, said he had often heard children's screams at two detention centres where he had been held by Syrian intelligence.
"I was blindfolded but I could hear the sound of children being tortured. There were women inside the prisons too. Even old men," said Hassan Al Hakim, 29, who described in detail how intelligence agents gave electric shocks to his genitals with cattle prods and beat the soles of his feet with sticks and cables for hours.
He said he had met the father of a seven-year-old boy who was tortured in his cell at a military intelligence prison known as the Palestine Branch in Damascus. He told Hakim he had been forced to watch as agents had stubbed out lighted cigarettes on his son's chest.
"They wanted to know where the man's brother was. They said he was supporting the rebels [revolutionaries]. They wanted him to confess," said Hakim, who bears the scars of his own torture from two months in Syria's prisons. "I still don't know what happened to the father or to his son."
Killings
The resignation last week of an Arab League monitor added weight to claims that the security forces were singling out children. "I witnessed the killing of Mohammad Al Raai, a child who was shot dead before our eyes by a sniper on December 28," said Anwar Malek, who had been in Homs.
He accused the regime of war crimes and of duping his colleagues by covering up atrocities and faking pro-Al Assad demonstrations in the city, which has become a symbol of the regime's crackdown on dissent.
Activists say the army regularly shells parts of Homs as it tightens the noose on protesters and members of the revolutionary Free Syrian Army.
Amran Mousa, five, was lucky to escape being murdered by Syrian soldiers when he fled to Lebanon with his mother after their home in Homs was destroyed.
They drove to the border but guards refused to let them cross. The pair contacted smugglers who help navigate the dirt tracks across foothills to secret border crossings.
As the mother and child crossed the crest of a hill, just a few hundred yards from Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, a Syrian patrol spotted them and opened fire.
A bullet pierced the child's leg, knocking him to the ground. Revolutionaries on the far side of the border, who were waiting for them, returned fire to give the mother cover as she grabbed her child and raced to safety.
Some of the refugees have to pick their way through freshly laid minefields.
http://gulfnews.com/news/region/syria/regime-accused-of-faking-pro-al-assad-demonstrations-1.968668
The officer in command snatched up the youngest child, a boy of seven months, from the corner of the living room, where the family were cowering.
Then he laid him on the floor, pulled out his army knife and cut off the baby's head, according to a soldier from the army's 11th Armoured Division who claims to have witnessed the killing.
He hung the head above the front door they had kicked down and screamed that the same fate would befall the other children unless their father gave himself up, the soldier claims.
The story was told last week by Mohammad, a fresh-faced 22-year-old who declined to give his full name. He said he had retched at the sight of the child's murder in the northwestern town of Jisr Al Shughur during an army operation after the deaths of 120 members of the security forces last June.
"That was when I decided to defect," he said, tears rolling down his cheeks as he spoke at an opposition safe house in the Lebanese city of Tripoli. "I'll have to live with that memory for ever. We did things I never want to remember."
Evidence
His claims adds to mounting evidence that President Bashar Al Assad's forces have targeted opponents' children in their campaign to crush a revolt. Activists in Homs released a video recently that purported to show the body of a four-month-old girl. A large red mark could be seen on her back. The activists alleged she had been tortured and killed by security forces.
The claims of Mohammad and the activists cannot be corroborated because the regime does not allow most journalists to travel independently. But their accounts seem consistent with reports of atrocities compiled by the UN, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
The Sunday Times interviewed former soldiers, civilians and activists who have fled the violence for Tripoli.
One activist who was arrested for making protest banners in the town of Talkalakh, said he had often heard children's screams at two detention centres where he had been held by Syrian intelligence.
"I was blindfolded but I could hear the sound of children being tortured. There were women inside the prisons too. Even old men," said Hassan Al Hakim, 29, who described in detail how intelligence agents gave electric shocks to his genitals with cattle prods and beat the soles of his feet with sticks and cables for hours.
He said he had met the father of a seven-year-old boy who was tortured in his cell at a military intelligence prison known as the Palestine Branch in Damascus. He told Hakim he had been forced to watch as agents had stubbed out lighted cigarettes on his son's chest.
"They wanted to know where the man's brother was. They said he was supporting the rebels [revolutionaries]. They wanted him to confess," said Hakim, who bears the scars of his own torture from two months in Syria's prisons. "I still don't know what happened to the father or to his son."
Killings
The resignation last week of an Arab League monitor added weight to claims that the security forces were singling out children. "I witnessed the killing of Mohammad Al Raai, a child who was shot dead before our eyes by a sniper on December 28," said Anwar Malek, who had been in Homs.
He accused the regime of war crimes and of duping his colleagues by covering up atrocities and faking pro-Al Assad demonstrations in the city, which has become a symbol of the regime's crackdown on dissent.
Activists say the army regularly shells parts of Homs as it tightens the noose on protesters and members of the revolutionary Free Syrian Army.
Amran Mousa, five, was lucky to escape being murdered by Syrian soldiers when he fled to Lebanon with his mother after their home in Homs was destroyed.
They drove to the border but guards refused to let them cross. The pair contacted smugglers who help navigate the dirt tracks across foothills to secret border crossings.
As the mother and child crossed the crest of a hill, just a few hundred yards from Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, a Syrian patrol spotted them and opened fire.
A bullet pierced the child's leg, knocking him to the ground. Revolutionaries on the far side of the border, who were waiting for them, returned fire to give the mother cover as she grabbed her child and raced to safety.
Some of the refugees have to pick their way through freshly laid minefields.
http://gulfnews.com/news/region/syria/regime-accused-of-faking-pro-al-assad-demonstrations-1.968668
