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The heads of the Arab League and the United Nations issued a joint call to Syria\u2019s warring parties on Friday urging them to observe a ceasefire over the Eid al-Adha holiday from October 26 to 28. <\/p>\nThe heads of the Arab League and the United Nations issued a joint call to Syria\u2019s warring parties on Friday urging them to observe a ceasefire over the Eid al-Adha holiday from October 26 to 28. <\/p>\n
Nabil al-Arabi and Ban Ki-moon pleaded with those fighting \u201cto heed the call of the special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi for a ceasefire and a cessation of all violence in all its forms during the period of the Eid al-Adha,\u201d according to AFP.<\/p>\n
As many as 239 people have been killed by the fire of Syrian forces across the country on Friday, Al Arabiya reported citing Syrian activists at the Local Coordination Committees.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe longer the violence lasts, the more difficult it will be to find a political solution and rebuild Syria,\u201d they said in a joint statement.
Brahimi, envoy for the United Nations and the Arab League, has been crisscrossing the region with the aim of convincing President Bashar al-Assad\u2019s main backers and his foes to support a truce during the Islamic festival of Eid al-Adha next week.<\/p>\n
Brahimi will meet Syrian officials over the next few days in an effort to secure a brief ceasefire in the worsening war between Assad\u2019s government and rebel forces.<\/p>\n
Brahimi, who arrived in the capital Damascus on Friday afternoon, will meet Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem on Saturday morning, the U.N. spokesman in Damascus, Khaled al-Masri, said. He did not say whether the envoy would meet Assad.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will talk about the ceasefire and the Syrian issue in general. It is important to decrease the violence — we will talk with the government and political parties and civil society about the Syrian issue,\u201d Brahimi told reporters upon arrival, according to Reuters.<\/p>\n
The violence showed no sign of abating, with opposition activists reporting heavy street clashes in Aleppo, Syria\u2019s biggest city, and intensified army bombing of towns along the strategic north-south highway.<\/p>\n
Iran also backed the ceasefire call but added that the main problem in Syria was foreign interference — a reference to support for the rebels by Gulf Arab states, the United Sates and other Western powers, and Turkey.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe consider the establishment of an immediate ceasefire an important step in helping the Syrian people,\u201d Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdullahian said, as quoted by Mehr news agency.<\/p>\n
Despite supportive words from backers of the warring factions, the task of securing even a temporary ceasefire is daunting in an intensifying conflict in which more than 33,000 people have been killed over 19 months.<\/p>\n
A previous ceasefire in April collapsed after just a few days, with each side blaming the other. Mediator Kofi Annan resigned his post in frustration a few months later. Next week\u2019s truce would be self-imposed, with no international observers.<\/p>\n
A rebel group calling itself the Joint Command for Military and Revolution Councils in Syria said in a video statement that it was willing to respect the ceasefire on condition that the Assad government released detainees, particularly women, and lifted the siege of the central city of Homs.<\/p>\n
It also called for a halt in air strikes and for access to humanitarian aid — something Assad has denied to several international organizations. It also said the army must not take advantage of the truce to fortify its positions.<\/p>\n
Other rebel groups say a decision has not yet been taken.<\/p>\n
The war pitting Assad\u2019s troops against the loosely organized rebel army trying to end his 12 years in power has intensified in recent months.<\/p>\n
On Thursday, 240 people were killed across the country in fighting and bombardments, from Damascus to Aleppo, the country\u2019s commercial center.<\/p>\n
Activists said that on Thursday planes had bombed apartment buildings and a mosque in the town of Maarat al-Numan, in the northern province of Idlib, which straddles the north-south highway, connecting the capital to Aleppo.<\/p>\n
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based opposition group that has a network of informants in Syria, said bombings continued into Friday in the same area.<\/p>\n
Source: Alarabiya.net<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The heads of the Arab League and the United Nations issued a joint call to Syria\u2019s warring parties on Friday urging them to observe a ceasefire over the Eid al-Adha holiday from October 26 to 28.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n