Russian Government = Pits

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Syrians take to the streets amid reports of more explosions

By the CNN Wire Staff

updated 7:00 AM EST, Fri February 10, 2012


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(CNN) -- Tens of thousands of Syrians took to the streets Friday to protest Russia and its recent veto of a United Nations resolution that would have condemned a brutal crackdown by President Bashar al-Assad.

The "Russia Is Killing Our Children" protest, organized by anti-government opposition groups, follows reports that troops in tanks stormed a suburb of the besieged city of Homs. Syria's third-largest city has become a flashpoint in the nearly yearlong uprising.

As anti-government protests escalate, Russia, a Soviet-era ally of the al-Assad regime, said it appears there is evidence of a foreign military presence in Syria.

"According to the latest reports that are now being verified, a foreign special task force has been deployed in Syria. In case these reports are proved to be true, the scenarios will be absolutely the same as it was in Libya," Alexei Puskhov, chairman of Russia's lower house of parliament, told journalists, according to the state-run Itar-Tass news agency.

"They are supporting the opposition and supplying it with arms, they propose an unbalanced resolution laying rigid conditions to Syria's ruling regime, while laying practically no demands to the opposition."

The accusation comes the same day Syrian state media accused terrorists of two explosions Friday that rocked Aleppo, a city considered one of al-Assad's seats of power.

At least 25 people were killed and 175 wounded in the blasts, according to Syrian TV.

The attacks targeted two security force buildings -- a military branch and a law enforcement headquarters, killing and wounding an unknown number of soldiers and civilians, according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency.

Syrian state TV showed images of burned and mangled bodies, and blown out windows in Aleppo.

A member of the opposition Free Syrian Students inside the city described hearing two explosions and what sounded like a loud gunfight coming from near a military hospital and a police headquarters.

"After the twin explosion, the sound of gunfire rang through the morning for about 20 minutes," the opposition member said.

To the south of Aleppo, in the besieged city of Homs, government troops in tanks and armored vehicles stormed the neighborhood of Inshaat, according to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition group.

The neighborhood has become a refuge for the opposition fleeing the fighting and shelling in the nearby neighborhood of Bab Amr, the group said.

Elsewhere, four people, including two children, were reported killed in violence in the Damascus suburb of Dumair, the LCC said.

CNN cannot independently confirm reports of violence or casualties in Syria because the government has severely limited the access of international journalists.

Al-Assad has repeatedly denied attacking civilians, saying Syrian forces are targeting armed gangs and foreign terrorists bent on destabilizing the government.

Nearly all other reports from within the country, however, tell a different story. The opposition in Homs describe explosions from mortars and tank shells launched by Syrian forces every few minutes, people bleeding to death in the streets for lack of medical attention, and snipers picking off civilians running for cover.

Video reportedly from Homs and posted online shows rubble and the remains of buildings as gunfire is heard in the background.

Satellite photos of Homs taken this month compared with photos taken in August 2010 show a changed city -- the recent photographs show swaths of burned-out areas, roofs blown off and streets emptied. The 2010 photos of the same areas show streets packed with vehicles, and crisp lines of buildings, their roofs intact.

A U.N. Security Council Resolution addressing the violence failed to pass over the weekend after Russia and China vetoed it. The 13 other Security Council members, including the United States, voted for the resolution, which was also supported by the European Union and the Arab League.

With the Security Council at an impasse, the United States and other countries have called for the creation of a "Friends of Democratic Syria" group to support a free and democratic Syria, said Victoria Nuland, the U.S. State Department spokeswoman.

Turkey, an intense critic of al-Assad's crackdown, has offered to host an international gathering on the Syria issue. It is hosting the office of the opposition Syrian National Council as well as the headquarters of the rebel Free Syrian Army.

"Damascus seems to have taken the U.N. Security Council veto as a license to kill," Ibrahim Kalin, the foreign policy adviser to Turkey's prime minister, wrote in a column published Friday in the Zaman newspaper.

Kalim said his government would try to gather international support for deeper "political, diplomatic and economic isolation" of the al-Assad regime.

CNN's Salma Abdelaziz contributed to this report.