Syrian troops bombed residential neighborhoods in the central city of Homs for the
fifth straight day today, killing scores of people in what activists say is the regime's
final push to retake areas controlled by the rebels. The violence comes as President
Bashar Assad's regime is becoming increasingly isolated over its bloody crackdown
on dissent. Five European countries and six Arab Gulf nations have pulled their ambassadors
out of Damascus, and the U.S. has closed its embassy in Syria. Germany, whose whose
envoy Syria this month, also said he would not be replaced. Opposition activist Abu
Abdo Alhomsy described the violence in Homs to journalists with Aljazeera. “We are
waiting to be killed here,” he said.
Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad was
bolstered Tuesday by a visit from Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who was
accompanied by Russia’s chief intelligence officer, Mikhail Fradkov. In the talks
in Damascus, the Russians pushed for a solution to the Syrian crisis that would include
reforms by the regime and a dialogue with the opposition - but not for Assad to step
down. The U.N. estimates the government crackdown has killed more than 5,400 people
since March. Hundreds more people are believed to have been killed since the U.N.
released that figure last month, though the ongoing violence has made it impossible
to collect and verify reliable data for an updated casualty estimate. Listen