Demos across Syria after Friday prayers

Nicosia, Sep 3: Huge demonstrations rocked Syria on Friday, including a rally urging Russia to stop arms sales to the regime and another in support of an official who resigned in protest at the government's brutal crackdown, activists said.

The protesters across Syria were responding to calls posted on the Internet for nationwide anti-regime demonstrations after the weekly Friday prayers under the banner of "death rather than humiliation."

The Local Coordination Committees (LCC) said demonstrators rallied outside the home of the attorney general of the flashpoint rebellious province of Hama in support of his reported decision to resign.

Mohammed Adnan al-Bakkour said in a contested video posted on YouTube late Wednesday that he has resigned in disgust at hundreds of killings and thousands of arrests by Assad's regime.

He said he took the decision after hundreds of jailed peaceful demonstrators were killed by the authorities and buried in mass graves, and 10,000 were arrested arbitrarily.

But Syrian officials say he had been kidnapped and announced he was quitting under duress.

The LCC said in a statement that "huge demonstrations" from the Hama province villages of Kfar Nabudah and Karnaz formed outside Bakkour's home "to support him." Another march took off from the northern city of Amuda, with protesters calling for the "fall of the regime" and some carrying signs "urging Russia to stop exporting sales to the (Syrian) regime," the LCC said.

AFP