DUBAI, Feb 7, (Agencies): Gulf Arab countries announced on Tuesday they were recalling their ambassadors from Damascus and expelling Syrian envoys in response to worsening violence in Syria.
Syria’s rulers had rejected Arab attempts to “solve this crisis and prevent the bloodshed of the Syrian people,” a statement from the Gulf Cooperation Council said.

“The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, current head of the council, announces that the GCC states have decided to withdraw all their ambassadors from Syria and also demand that all ambassadors of the Syrian regime in its lands leave immediately,” said the six-member council, which includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“The council considers that it is necessary for the Arab states... to take every decisive measure faced with this dangerous escalation against the Syrian people. Nearly a year into the crisis, there is no glint of hope in a solution.”

The group’s foreign ministers are meeting in Riyadh on Saturday to discuss the situation in Syria.
Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah called on the international community this week to take steps to “protect innocent lives and end the bloodshed” and warned that the violence threatened regional stability.
The world’s top oil exporter, one of the leading Arab powers, has long viewed President Bashar al-Assad’s government with distrust due to Assad’s alliance with Saudi Arabia’s regional arch-rival Iran.
Saudi Arabia was the first country to withdraw its monitors from an Arab League observer mission to the country last month, followed by the other GCC members.

Meanwhile, Russia’s foreign minister said after talks in Damascus on Tuesday that President Bashar al-Assad was “fully committed” to ending the bloodshed in Syria even as regime tanks pounded the city of Homs for a fourth straight day, killing at least 15 civilians.

Sergei Lavrov said he had had a “very useful” meeting with Assad and that Moscow was eager to work towards a solution based on the peace proposals of the Arab League.

“We (Russia) confirmed our readiness to act for a rapid solution to the crisis based on the plan put forward by the Arab League,” said Lavrov, adding that Syria was ready to see an enlarged Arab League mission in the country, Russian news agencies said.

The pan-Arab bloc deployed an observer mission to Syria in December to oversee a November plan to end bloodshed that has now lasted almost 11 months.

But the mission was suspended in late January after its chief said the violence had reached a new pitch of intensity despite its presence.

The 22-member League has since put forward a new plan for Assad to hand his powers to Vice President Faruq al-Shara and a national unity government to oversee the preparation of democratic elections.

Shara, a veteran regime diplomat with a career that stretches back to the ruler of Assad’s late father president Hafez al-Assad, attended Tuesday’s talks with Lavrov, the official SANA news agency said.
Lavrov did not specify which of the two Arab plans he was referring to in his comments Tuesday, although SANA interpreted him as referring to the earlier one.

Moscow had previously criticised foreign calls for Assad to step down but in an interview with Australian television last week Lavrov insisted: “We never said that President Assad remaining in power is the solution to the crisis.”

After Tuesday’s talks, he said he believed Damascus had heard Moscow’s message but did not go into details.

“We have every reason to believe that the signal that we’ve brought here to move along in a more active manner along all directions has been heard.”

Lavrov said Syria was pressing ahead with the reform programme Assad promised in a series of speeches last year and would soon announce the timetable for a referendum on a new constitution to replace the current one which enshrines the dominant role of his Baath party.
SANA said that Assad would receive the text drawn up by an appointed panel on Wednesday.
Lavrov said Assad was also ready for dialogue with all parties.
“It’s clear that efforts to stop violence should be accompanied by the start of dialogue between all the political forces.”
“Today we’ve received confirmation of President Assad’s readiness to facilitate this work,” he said.
But on the ground, there was no let-up in the regime’s crackdown on protest hubs around the country, particularly the central city of Homs, Syria’s third-largest.
Killing
Tanks and artillery pounded Homs for a fourth straight day, killing at least 15 civilians, according to activists, as the interior ministry vowed no let-up in the onslaught against “terrorist groups”.
“Operations to hunt down terrorist groups will continue until security and order are re-established in all neighbourhoods of Homs and its environs,” pledged an interior ministry statement carried by SANA.
Abu Rami, an activist in the city reached by AFP by telephone from Beirut, said shelling and rocket fire had continued through the night and into the day.
“There are about four blasts every five minutes,” he said. “Since this morning the shelling has been concentrated in the neighbourhoods of Baba Amr, Inshaat and Jubar. The humanitarian situation is dire. No one can move around.”
At least nine civilians and four soldiers were killed as the army attempted to storm the Khaldiyeh neighbourhood of the city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. One of the slain civilians was a woman.
Another six civilians were killed in Baba Amr, the Britain-based watchdog added, adding that a further six civilians were killed elsewhere in the country on Tuesday.
Shooting thought to be from outgunned rebels fighters echoed across Baba Amr through the morning in response to the artillery barrage from besieging troops.
The opposition Syrian National Council joined the Free Syrian Army in issuing an appeal to businessmen across the Arab world to give money to the rebel force to help rectify the imbalance in firepower.
Human rights groups say more than 6,000 people have been killed since the outbreak of the revolt. The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, said at least 400 children are among the dead.
Moscow sparked Western anger last week by joining Beijing in using its veto at the Security Council to block UN action against the Damascus regime, in what US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called a “travesty.”
A day after the United States closed its Damascus embassy, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain joined Britain and Belgium on Tuesday in recalling their ambassadors to Syria for consultations.
Turkey, which shared Western anger over the Russian and Chinese vetoes, said it would launch a “new initiative” with like-minded countries which “stand by the Syrian people, not the regime.”
Meanwhile, activists said the Syrian central city of Homs was undergoing heavy shelling on Tuesday, with security forces seeking to seize a key neighbourhood where rebel forces have a significant presence.
“The neighbourhood of Baba Amr has been undergoing shelling since early morning and there is a bid to launch an assault on the area where heavy gunfire can be overheard,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The Britain-based group said nearly 70 civilians were killed in Homs and its environs on Monday amid the fiercest assault yet on the protest hub since the outbreak of a nationwide popular revolt against the regime of al-Assad.
Nearly 30 were also killed in clashes elsewhere, including Idlib in the northwest and in districts near Damascus, where clashes were continuing on Tuesday.
The government has blamed the violence on “armed terrorist gangs” and has vowed to pursue its assault on Homs.
“Operations to hunt down terrorist groups will continue until security and order are re-established in all neighbourhoods of Homs and its environs and until we overcome all armed persons terrorising citizens and threatening their life,” it added.
Abu Rami, an activist in Homs reached by telephone, said the shelling of the city had continued through the night.
“There are about four blasts every five minutes,” he said. “Since this morning the shelling has been concentrated in the neighbourhoods of Baba Amro, Inshaat and Jubar.
“The humanitarian situation is dire. No one can move around. There are snipers everywhere,” he added.
Skepticism
The United States on Tuesday voiced skepticism of promises by Assad to Russia’s foreign minister and said that he should instead immediately end the violence.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the United States would withhold judgment on Lavrov’s visit to Damascus but criticized Assad for making new pledges of domestic reforms.
“You can understand that the international community as a whole would be pretty skeptical of, instead of focusing on ending the violence, what we seem to have is a re-upping of this same offer that Assad has been making for months and months and months,” Nuland told reporters.
Meanwhile in London, the British-born wife of Syria’s president has spoken in support of her husband for the first time since the 11-month uprising against his regime began, a British newspaper reported Tuesday.
“The President is the President of Syria, not a faction of Syrians, and the First Lady supports him in that role,” The Times quoted Asma al-Assad as saying in an email sent via an intermediary from her office.
The email is her first communication with the international media since the uprising against Assad’s regime began, The Times said.
“The First Lady’s very busy agenda is still focused on supporting the various charities she has long been involved with and rural development as well as supporting the President as needed,” the email reportedly continued.
“These days she is equally involved in bridging gaps and encouraging dialogue. She listens to and comforts the families of the victims of the violence.” it added.
The statement came after Syrian forces pounded protest hubs with rockets and shells, killing 79 civilians on Monday, according to activists, and as Britain recalled its ambassador to Syria “for consultations”.
Unlike her husband, a minority Alawite, the 36-year-old First Lady is a Sunni Muslim who originally hails from Homs — the central Syrian city rocked by some of the worst carnage since the revolt began in March last year.
Stylish and charismatic and with a degree from King’s College in London where she was raised, the former investment banker had helped promote the soft side of an iron-fisted regime.
But she has virtually disappeared from the public eye since the revolt broke out and had drawn criticism for her silence on a crisis that has left more than 5,000 people dead in her country.
Last month she appeared with two of her children to support her husband of 12 years as he spoke at a pro-regime rally, but did not speak herself.
Meanwhile, Turkey will launch a “new initiative” with like-minded countries after the rejection of a UN resolution to end months-long bloodshed in neighbouring Syria, its prime minister said on Tuesday.
“We will start a new initiative with those countries who stand by the Syrian people, not the regime,” Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in parliament, without elaborating.
“We are working on this initiative,” Erdogan said, adding his government would use all diplomatic means to draw the world’s attention to the Syrian crisis.
Pressure
In another development, the European Union stepped up pressure on Syria on Tuesday as several nations recalled their ambassadors from Damascus and the bloc considered new sanctions to cut the regime’s access to cash.
France, Italy, and Spain announced they were bringing back their envoys for consultations, after Britain, Belgium and the United States took similar steps in protest at the regime’s relentless crackdown on protesters.
Paris denounced the “worsening repression” while Rome voiced the “firm condemnation and disgust of the Italian government for the unacceptable violence perpetrated by the regime in Damascus against the civilian population”.
French foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero called on Lavrov to use Russia’s influence to pressure Syria into accepting a regional peace plan.
“We expect Mr Lavrov will use his visit to Damascus to make the regime understand its isolation and to support the Arab League plan, a brave initiative that must be the basis of any solution,” he said.
The 27-member EU began discussing new measures against Syria’s central bank and a ban on gold and gems after China and Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution backing the League plan aimed at ending the violence.
“There’s a long way to go yet, but we’re looking at economic measures which will tighten further the Syrian regime’s access to sources of finance,” a diplomat said.