Syria has opened its prisons for the first time to the Red Cross whose officials visited detainees in the central prison in Damascus, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said today.
"The Syrian authorities have granted the ICRC access to a place of detention for the first time. Initially, we will have access to persons detained by the Ministry of the Interior and we are hopeful that we will soon be able to visit all detainees," ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said in a statement issued at the end of a two-day visit to Damascus.
Mr Kellenberger said the prison visits, which began yesterday, were "an important step forward for our humanitarian activities in Syria" and that he had pressed Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in talks today to ensure that the wounded were treated.
Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby will visit Syria on Wednesday to pass on Arab concerns about the Syrian government's violent crackdown on protests against President Bashar al-Assad's rule, Egypt's news agency MENA reported today.
Mr Elaraby said yesterday the Syrian government had accepted a request from the Arab League for a visit.
Arab governments broke months of silence at a meeting at the League's headquarters in Cairo last week demanding Syria end months of bloodshed, and decided to send Mr Elaraby to Damascus to push for political and economic reforms.
Elsewhere, Syrian forces today began their biggest sweep against popular unrest in Syria's northwest near Turkey since June, killing a civilian in raids meant to stop protesters escaping across the border, residents said.
The latest developments come as the British prime minister and Qatar called on Dr Assad to stand down.
Adelsalam Hassoun (24), a blacksmith, was killed by army snipers today just after he had crossed into Turkey from the village of Ain al-Baida on the Syrian side, his cousin told Reuters by telephone from Syria.
"Abdelsalam was hit in the head. He was among a group of family members and other refugees who dashed across the plain to Turkey when six armoured personnel carrier deployed outside Ain al-Baida and started firing their machineguns into the village at random this morning," Mohammad Hassoun said
Thousands of families fled their homes in the northern border region in June when troops assaulted town and villages that had seen big protests against Dr Assad.
Faced with a heavy security presence in central neighbourhoods of Damascus and Aleppo, and military assaults against a swathe of cities from Latakia on the coast to Deir al-Zor in the East, street rallies calling for political freedoms and an end to 41 years of Assad family rule have intensified in towns and villages across the country of 20 million.
Demonstrators have been encouraged by the fall of Libya's Muammar Gadafy and growing international pressure on Dr Assad. The European Union has imposed an embargo on Syrian oil exports, jeopardising a major source of revenue for dr Assad, who inherited power from his father, the late Hafez al-Assad, in 2000.
Qatar's Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa, who once backed Dr Assad, said ordinary people in Syria has made it clear it will not back down despite daily killings.
"It's clear now after the protests that have taken place in Syria . . . [that] the killing is almost daily. It's clear that the people will not abandon their demands, the question is how to get out of this internal deadlock in Syria," he said.
Tiny Qatar, which has significant regional clout, was the first Arab country to criticise Dr Assad's bloody crackdown, closing its embassy in Damascus two months ago after the building was attacked by pro-Assad militiamen.
British prime minister David Cameron today said Dr Assad has lost all legitimacy and must step aside for the good of his country.
Dr Assad has repeatedly said he is fighting agents of what he calls a foreign plot to divide Syria. Syrian authorities, who have expelled most foreign media, blame "armed terrorist groups" for the bloodshed and say that 500 army and police have been killed by such gangs.
Daily protests have increased in northwestern regions that include the cities of Homs, Hama, Idlib and the main port city of Latakia, prompting an escalation of military raids that killed hundreds of Syrians in the last month, rights groups say. Thousands more people have also been arrested, according to residents and human rights campaigners.
Reuters