Amnesty says patients tortured in Syrian hospitals

Patients in Syrian state hospitals are subjected to torture and mistreatment as part of the government’s crackdown on dissent, while medics are also being targeted, Amnesty International said, as a leading Syrian rights activist
said that Damascus has detained more than 30,000 people since launching March.

“The Syrian government has turned hospitals into instruments of repression in its efforts to crush opposition,” London-based Amnesty said in a 39-page report released late on Monday.

The report documented how wounded patients in at least four government-run hospitals had been subjected to torture and other ill-treatment, both by medical workers and security personnel.

And “hospital workers suspected of treating protesters and others injured in unrest-related incidents have themselves faced arrest and torture,” it said, leaving them in a dilemma, according to AFP.

“It is deeply alarming that the Syrian authorities seem to have given the security forces a free rein in hospitals, and that in many cases hospital staff appear to have taken part in torture and ill treatment of the very people they are supposed to care for,” said Cilina Nasser, Amnesty International Middle East and North Africa researcher.

“Afraid of the consequences of going to a government hospital, many people have chosen to seek treatment either at private hospitals or at poorly equipped makeshift field hospitals,” the report said.

“Syrian medical workers are being placed in an impossible situation -- forced to choose between treating wounded people and preserving their own safety,” it said.

30,000 have been detained

The Syrian government has detained more than 30,000 people since launching a deadly crackdown on opposition protests in March, a leading Syrian rights activist said Monday, as Washington condemned the Syrian army’s incursions into Lebanon and said that dissidents of the Damascus regime had either been killed or taken prisoner at the border.

President Bashar al-Assad’s government has turned all the country’s main football stadiums into prisons, Radwan Ziadeh, co-founder of the Damascus Center for Human Rights and scholar at George Washington University in Washington, told a press conference at the U.N. headquarters, according to AFP.

Speaking at the launch of the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders annual report, Ziadeh said nobody knew the exact figure for the number of detainees.

The United Nations says that more than 3,000 people have been killed.

Based on reports from activists working underground in Syria, Ziadeh said: “We have an estimate number that more than 30,000 have been detained.”

“My brother is in prison since August 30 and I have no information about him.” He added that he also had no news of an uncle and three cousins, one of them 14 years old, who had also been held.

“You can imagine, five relatives only from one family in one small city. This is why the number that has been detained -- 30,000 -- is an estimate number,” said Ziadeh, who has been condemned by Syrian media close to the country’s president.

“The Syrian regime actually cancelled the football championship because they turned over all the soccer fields to be detention centers and torture centers,” he said.

U.N. Security Council’s failure

The al-Fayhaa stadium in Damascus, the Assad stadium in Latakia, the main stadium in the city of city of Deraa were being used to hold thousands of prisoners, said Ziadeh.

Ziadeh said that the U.N. Security Council’s failure to pass a resolution on the Syria crisis had made opponents of Assad more desperate and more ready to use guns “to defend themselves against the security forces.”

Russia and China vetoed a proposed European resolution on Syria, saying there should be no threat of sanctions against Assad.

Western powers again criticized the veto at a council meeting on the Middle East on Monday.

France’s U.N. ambassador Gerard Araud said that tens of thousands of activists were being held in secret in Syria.

Araud said that those who vetoed the resolution or abstained must explain to the Syrian people and international opinion “what concrete action they propose to end this blood bath.”

“It is tragic that Assad’s barbaric acts have recently been met by silence from this council,” added U.S. ambassador Susan Rice.

Syrian army’s incursions into Lebanon

The United States, meanwhile, condemned the Syrian army’s incursions into neighboring Lebanon and suggested that dissidents of the Damascus regime had either been killed or taken prisoner at the border.

“Over the course of the last few weeks, it appears Syrian forces have entered Lebanese territory,” a State Department spokesman told reporters, denouncing the move and calling on Syria to respect Lebanon’s sovereignty, according to AFP.

“We are also deeply concerned by indications that Syrian dissidents may have been captured and possibly killed during operations near the border.”

Syria on Monday recalled its ambassador to Washington, according to an official television station, shortly after the United States said it had pulled out its envoy from Damascus for safety reasons.

The State Department said Ambassador Robert Ford, an open critic of President Assad’s crackdown on political dissent, had left Syria indefinitely after “credible threats” against his security.

Lebanese officials estimate that 5,000 Syrians, including deserting soldiers and opposition members, have sought refuge in Lebanon since the uprising against Assad erupted in March.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon last week called on Syria to end incursions into Lebanon after Syrian troops shot three of its citizens dead near the border, warning that such raids could ignite tensions in the region.

Syria first sent it troops into Lebanon months after the outbreak of the country’s 1975-1990 civil war, and kept them deployed in its smaller neighbor for 29 years.

Assad withdrew forces from Beirut in the aftermath of the 2005 assassination of billionaire former premier Rafiq al-Hariri, whose killing was initially widely blamed on Syria.

The powerful Shiite militant group Hezbollah, an ally of Syria’s Bashar Assad, currently controls the majority of seats in Lebanon’s cabinet with its allies.

Saudi Arabia holds funeral of Crown Prince Sultan

Saudi Arabia held the funeral of Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz on Tuesday in the presence of King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz and world dignitaries who arrived in Riyadh to offer condolences for the late Prince, whose successor is yet to be named.

The body of Prince Sultan was flown back to Riyadh late Monday. Hundreds of men, including Saudi King Abdullah, gathered on the airport runway to watch as the coffin was lowered into an ambulance and driven away, Reuters reported.

Al Arabiya TV aired live pictures from Riyadh Air Base where Sultan’s body was taken from the plane in an ambulance.
It is the first time that the seat of the heir to the throne becomes vacant in the history of the oil-rich Gulf state.

Saudi Arabia, which dominates world oil markets and holds profound influence over Muslims through its guardianship of Islam’s holiest sites in Mecca and Medina, faces turbulence in its neighbors and a confrontation with regional rival Iran.

Sultan’s death comes also after Abdullah created in 2006 the Allegiance Council, comprised of 35 princes charged with deciding together with the reigning king who will be crown prince.

“The rules of the Allegiance Council stipulate that the crown prince would be chosen by the council,” said Fahd al-Harthi, head of the Riyadh-based ASBAR Centre for Studies, Research and Communications.

“But the royal decree of this system has stated that the current king and crown prince are not forced to abide by this regulation,” he told AFP.

King Abdullah, Sultan and Nayef have run the country since the late King Fahd fell ill in 1995, but the monarch is in his late 80s and has spent three months abroad this year recovering from a back problem that again required surgery last week.

He remains firmly in control of the kingdom, but the focus will increasingly fall on Nayef, who is thought to be in the mid-seventies, and some younger princes.

Chief among them is Prince Salman, the Riyadh governor who is a full brother of Sultan and Nayef and is seen as next most important in a ruling family that has prized seniority since it was founded by King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud in 1932.

Reforms enacted by King Abdullah have aimed to strengthen private sector growth and loosen the grip of conservative clerics on the education system and judiciary.

World dignitaries were arriving in the Knigdom on Monday to offer their condolences for the late Prince.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak were among the world leaders heading to the Saudi capital to offer condolences.

Relations between the Sunni-dominated kingdom and Shiite Iran, its arch rival across the Gulf, are tense following an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate the kingdom’s envoy to Washington.

Saudi Arabia also keeps a close eye on developments in neighboring Bahrain and Yemen, as well as other countries hit by the so-called “Arab Spring” uprisings demanding regime change.

Saudi Arabia was largely spared from the wave of popular protest movements, which has so far unseated three Arab leaders.

Islamists claim win in Tunisia's Arab Spring vote

Official results Tunisia's first democratic election will be announced on Tuesday, but the Ennahda party said it had already tallied results posted at polling stations after Sunday's vote, the first since the uprisings which began in Tunisia and spread through the region.

"The first confirmed results show that Ennahda has obtained first place," campaign manager Abdelhamid Jlazzi said outside party headquarters in the centre of the Tunisian capital.
As he spoke, a crowd of more than 300 in the street shouted "Allahu Akbar!" or "God is greatest!". Other people started singing the Tunisian national anthem.
Mindful that some people in Tunisia and elsewhere see the resurgence of Islamists as a threat to modern, liberal values, party officials said they were prepared to form an alliance with two secularist parties, Congress for the Republic and Ettakatol.
"We will spare no effort to create a stable political alliance ... We reassure the investors and international economic partners," Jlazzi said.
Two days after an unprecedented 90 percent of voters turned out for the election, officials were still counting the ballot papers in some areas. They said nationwide results would not be ready before Tuesday afternoon.
Sunday's vote was for an assembly which will sit for one year to draft a new constitution. It will also appoint a new interim president and government to run the country until fresh elections late next year or early in 2013.
The voting system has built-in checks and balances which make it nearly impossible for any one party to have a majority, compelling Ennahda to seek alliances with secularist parties, which will dilute its influence.
"This is an historic moment," said Zeinab Omri, a young woman in a hijab, or Islamic head scarf, who was outside the Ennahda headquarters when party officials claimed victory.
"No one can doubt this result. This result shows very clearly that the Tunisian people is a people attached to its Islamic identity," she said.
Tunisia became the birthplace of the "Arab Spring" when Mohamed Bouazizi, a vegetable seller in a provincial town, set fire to himself in protest at poverty and government repression.
His suicide in December provoked a wave of protests which forced autocratic president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali to flee to Saudi Arabia the following month.
The revolution in Tunisia, a former French colony, in turn inspired uprisings which forced out entrenched leaders in Egypt and Libya, and convulsed Yemen and Syria -- re-shaping the political landscape of the Middle East.
Ennahda is led by Rachid Ghannouchi, forced into exile in Britain for 22 years because of harassment by Ben Ali's police. A softly spoken scholar, he dresses in suits and open-necked shirts while his wife and daughter wear the hijab.
Ghannouchi is at pains to stress his party will not enforce any code of morality on Tunisian society, or the millions of Western tourists who holiday on its beaches. He models his approach on the moderate Islamism of Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.
The party's rise has been met with ambivalence by some people in Tunisia. The country's strong secularist traditions go back to the first post-independence president, Habiba Bourguiba, who called the hijab an "odious rag".
Outside the offices of the commission which organised the election, about 50 people staged a sit-in demanding an investigation into what they said were irregularities committed by Ennahda. Election officials said any problems were minor.
"I really feel a lot of fear and concern after this result," said Meriam Othmani, a 28-year-old journalist. "Women's rights will be eroded," she said. "Also, you'll see the return of dictatorship once Ennahda achieves a majority in the constituent assembly."
Ennahda's preferred coalition partners may reassure some opponents. Ali Larayd, a member of the party's executive committee, said it was ready to form an alliance with the Congress for the Republic and Ettakatol, both secularist groups respected by Tunisia's intelligentsia.
The Congress is led by Moncef Marzouki, a doctor and human rights activist who spent years in exile in France. Ettakatol is a socialist party led by Mustafa Ben Jaafar, another doctor and veteran Ben Ali opponent.
The only official results released were from polling stations abroad, because they voted early.
The election commission said that out of 18 seats in the 217-seat assembly allocated to the Tunisian diaspora, 9 went to Ennahda. Its closest rivals were Marzouki's Congress on four seats and Ettakatol, which won three.
The highest-profile secularist challenger to Ennahda, the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) conceded defeat. It had warned voters that modern, liberal values would be threatened if the Islamists won.
"The PDP respects the democratic game. The people gave their trust to those it considers worthy of that trust. We congratulate the winner and we will be in the ranks of the opposition," a party statement sent to Reuters said.
Ennahda's win was a remarkable turnaround for a party which just 10 months ago had to operate underground because of a government ban and which had hundreds of followers in prison.
In a slick and well-funded campaign, the party tapped into a desire among ordinary Tunisians to be able to express their faith freely after years of aggressively enforced secularism.
It also sought to show it could represent all Tunisians, including the large number who take a laissez-faire view of Islam's strictures, drink alcohol, wear revealing clothes and rarely visit the mosque.
Secularist opponents say they believe this is just a cleverly constructed front that conceals more radical views, especially among Ennahda's rank and file in the provinces.

Yemeni government and rival forces declare truce

Yemen's government and dissident general Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, whose forces have been engaged in bloody battles for weeks, reached a ceasefire agreement on Tuesday, an official statement said, as witnesses reported more fighting in the country.

Tribal forces, led by the powerful chief Sheikh Sadeq al-Ahmar, who has thrown his support behind the pro-democracy movement that has rocked Yemen, also agreed to the ceasefire, sources in his office told AFP.
Though an official government statement published on the state news agency website said the truce went into immediate effect, residents and an AFP correspondent in the capital's Hasaba district where Sadeq resides said the sounds of gunfire and explosions were heard.
Tuesday's cease-fire announcement came after a bloody day in the capital and Yemen's second largest city Taez, with at least 10 people killed and dozens of others wounded in clashes, shelling and a government crackdown on protesters, medical officials said.
The official online statement announcing the truce said a committee assigned to negotiate with the opposition forces "declared a cease-fire in the capital Sanaa that will go into effect at 3:00pm (12 GMT) today (Tuesday) with the goal of... bringing calm... and ensuring the safety of the capital, its people and their properties."
The statement added that the government and rival forces would remove checkpoints and barricades set up throughout the capital in recent weeks as clashes and battles intensified between the feuding parties.
The statement did not promise to end the harsh government crackdown on unarmed protesters in Sanaa or any other Yemeni city that has left hundreds dead and thousands wounded since January.
This is the third cease-fire declared since May between the government and tribal chief Sadeq, whose well-armed tribesman have been engaged in fierce battles with Saleh's troops in the capital's Hasaba district in recent days.
The two previous cease-fires were breached soon after the declaration of an agreement.
However it is the first agreement reached between Saleh and general Mohsen, who defected in March in support of the tens of thousands of protesters that since January have been calling for the resignation of the Yemeni president.
Mohsen's First Armoured Brigade troops have been battling Saleh loyalists in the capital in recent weeks, raising tensions and stoking fears in the international community that Yemen was headed towards civil war.
Tuesday's announcement came just hours after Saleh's troops opened fire on thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators in the capital killing two people and wounding at least 40 others.
The cease-fire declaration does not apply to other Yemeni cities, including the flashpoint city of Taez, where at least seven civilians were killed on Tuesday, including a seven-year-old child, during what residents said was random shelling by government forces of city neighbourhoods.
Medics also said that a Yemeni policeman was killed in the violence.
Saleh loyalists are fighting tribesman and other militias in Taez that have joined the call for Saleh's ouster.
Saleh has for months refused to step down after 33-years in power, despite repeated regional and international calls for him to do so.
The escalating violence in the country provoked a UN resolution last week that called for Saleh to immediately sign a Gulf-brokered power transition plan in return for immunity from prosecution.
On Monday, Saleh welcomed the UN resolution but did not specify when or if he would sign the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) initiative.
Officials told AFP on Tuesday that Saleh is negotiating to modify the initiative to ensure he remain president until early elections are called. He is also lobbying to remove a clause in the agreement that calls for the restructuring of Yemen's security forces in the event of his resignation.
The opposition and the tens of thousands of activists that have been camped out in the capital's Change Square are not likely to accept Saleh's proposed modifications, particularly since Saleh's sons and closest relatives command Yemen's military forces.

US envoy leaves Syria over security fears

The United States ambassador to Syria has left the country over security concerns, with Washington blaming Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government for what it called "credible threats against his personal safety".

Mark Toner, the US State Department spokesman, said on Monday that Robert Ford, who has visited several hubs of anti-government protest during the seven months of protests against Assad's rule, had returned to Washington this weekend.

Toner said the US embassy will remain open in Damascus and that the threats were specifically directed toward Ford. He added that Ford's return to Damascus would depend on a US "assessment of Syrian regime-led incitement and the security situation on the ground".
Ford has come in for heavy criticism in Damascus by pro-government supporters who have accused him of helping incite violence in the country.

The latest diplomatic crisis between Damascus and Washington came as 16 people were reportedly killed in new violence, including eight civilians in the central city of Homs, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights .

Deadly crackdown
Within hours of the news of Ford's departure, Syria recalled its ambassador to Washington, an official television station reported.

"Syria's ambassador to the United States, Imad Mustapha, will leave Washington for Damascus to hold consultations with Syrian leaders," Al-Ikhbariya television reported.

A US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, noted Ford was not officially "withdrawn" from Syria but rather was
called back for consultations because of security concerns.

During months-long anti-government uprising, Ford has courted the opposition and denounced Assad on Facebook. As the government instituted a deadly crackdown on protests, Ford defied a travel ban on Western diplomats by going to hotspots and meeting with anti-government demonstrators.

Last month pro-government demonstrators threw rocks, concrete blocks and tomatoes at Ford and his aides, as well as
attacking their cars with metal bars, during their visit with an opposition figure in Damascus.

Western diplomats told Reuters that Ford left Syria on Saturday.

"Articles, more inciting against Ford than usual, have appeared in state media recently," said a diplomat who asked not to be identified.
Diplomatic pressure

The US administration of President Barack Obama decided to return an ambassador to Syria earlier this year in an effort to persuade Syria to change its policies regarding Israel, Lebanon, Iraq and support for extremist groups. Syria is designated a "state sponsor of terrorism'' by the State Department.
The US Senate earlier this month unanimously confirmed Ford's appointment as ambassador to Syria, calling it "a tough message" to Assad and a sign of US "solidarity with the Syrian people".
"Despite even being physically attacked and assaulted by the regime's goons, Ford continues courageously to visit cities under military siege and speak truth to power," John Kerry, a US senator, said at the time.
Washington has called on the UN Security Council and the international community to "dramatically" increase pressure on Syria over its bloody response to opposition to the government in Damascus.
According to the United Nations, more than 3,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in the crackdown on the protests since the uprising against Assad’s government started in March.

Egyptian foreign ministry warns of fake employment contracts in Libya

The foreign ministry has warned Egyptians of the risk of obtaining fake work contracts in Libya, as it embarks to rebuild itself following the killing of Muammar Gaddafi.
“Libya has expelled a number of Egyptians who flew to the country with fake work contracts attributed to the Libyan authorities,” Egyptian foreign ministry spokesman Amr Roshdy said.
The ministry also told Egyptians to be alert for fraudulent offers of work.
“Some people stole null contracts and sold them for Egyptians who are seeking to work in Libya,” the ministry said in a statement.
“Once they arrived in Libya, they were expelled because of those fake contracts.
“The foreign ministry calls on Egyptian people not to trust any such contracts unless they are approved by Libyan authorities.
“All the current work contracts in Libya include the logo of the National Transitional Council [Libya’s interim rulers].”
Libya is set to officially declare its liberation on Sunday after Gaddafi, who ruled the North African oil-rich country for 42 years, was killed in his hometown Sirte on Thursday.

Israel and Egypt agree to swap alleged spy for 25 prisoners

Egypt and Israel said Monday they have finalized arrangements to exchange an alleged Israeli spy for 25 Egyptians held in Israeli jails, on the heels of a Hamas-Israel prisoner swap.

“Egypt has agreed to release Ilan Grapel and at Egypt’s request Israel has agreed to free 25 Egyptian prisoners,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

According to the statement, the Egyptians lined up for release –including three minors – are not security prisoners.

Egypt’s official MENA news agency said the swap is expected to take place “in the next two days.”

The deal is subject to the approval of Israel's 14-member security cabinet which is due to convene on Tuesday, the statement said. But it is highly unlikely to reject the agreement.

The U.S.-brokered deal was reached days after a successful Egyptian-brokered swap between Israel and Hamas Islamists that freed captive soldier Gilad Shalit in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners.

Grapel, 27, was arrested in Egypt and accused of being a spy out to recruit agents and monitor events in the revolt that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak in February, an ally of both the United States and Israel.

Israel has strongly denied the charges, insisting the whole thing was a mistake and accusing Egyptian authorities of “bizarre behavior.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told reporters earlier on Monday he hoped Grapel “will be freed as soon as possible” and strongly denied he had been involved in any espionage.

Grapel’s mother said at the time of his arrest that her son, a law student in the United States, was working for Saint Andrew's Refugee Services, a non-governmental organization, in Cairo.

Grapel, a dual U.S.-Israeli national, immigrated to Israel in 2005 from New York and served in its military in a 2006 war with Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called on Egypt while on a visit to the region this month to release Grapel, but denied he was involved in direct negotiations over the matter.

The deal for Grapel may also ease strains in Israeli-Egyptian ties since summer when five Egyptian security personnel were killed during a cross-border shooting at the Israeli frontier in August, an incident in which eight Israelis were also killed by gunmen who ambushed a road.

Israel apologized to Egypt for the shootings earlier this month as Cairo had insisted, citing a joint investigation which showed Egyptian police had died “as a result of gunfire by our (Israeli) forces.”

Egypt was the first of two Arab countries to sign a peace agreement with Israel, in a deal concluded in 1979. Jordan signed a treaty with the Jewish state in 1994.