Fighting broke out in Tartus, western Syria, on Wednesday, leaving nine people dead. Security forces were trying to arrest an officer of the deposed government.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) reported nine deaths this Wednesday, December 25 in clashes between armed men and security forces who were trying to arrest an officer of the deposed government.
Six members of the security services were killed along with “three armed men”, after security forces tried to arrest an official of the power of former President Bashar al-Assad, in Tartous, in the west of the country, indicated the OSDH.
A former officer who “pronounced death sentences”
The NGO indicated that the wanted man, a former director of military justice, was accused of being “one of those responsible for crimes at Saydnaya prison, near Damascus”, infamous for its inhumane conditions and its central role in the violent repression carried out by the Assad clan.
The ex-officer had “pronounced death sentences and arbitrary judgments against thousands of prisoners,” added the OSDH, without disclosing his name.
An official of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the radical Islamist group which led the rebel coalition that overthrew Assad on December 8, confirmed to AFP clashes between security forces of the new authorities and supporters of the former power in the province of Tartous, stronghold of Assad's Alawite minority, without specifying the reasons.
Several members of the security forces were killed, said the official, who requested anonymity. The clashes broke out after “residents refused to have their homes searched,” the OSDH said, adding that “dozens of people” had been arrested.
Thirteen years of civil war in Syria left more than half a million dead and divided the vast country in zones of influence controlled by different belligerents supported by regional and international powers.
