Syrian tanks reclaim two Damascus suburbs

DAMASCUS, Syria, Jan. 30 (UPI) -- Syrian tanks reclaimed two Damascus suburbs' central squares from rebels Monday after a day of brutal fighting involving thousands of troops, witnesses said.

At least 19 people were killed in the Kfar Batna suburb -- 14 of them civilians caught in the crossfire -- after about 2,000 troops, supported by at least 50 tanks and armored vehicles, began a major operation against four suburbs at dawn Sunday about 6 miles east and southeast of the capital, activists said.

Grisly video posted online by opposition activists purported to show civilian corpses littering Kfar Batna's streets.

Mosques became makeshift hospitals Sunday and doctors appealed for blood as advancing troops waged a relentless and indiscriminate artillery barrage on four conservative Sunni Muslim suburbs, activists said.

The suburbs are surrounded by the Damascus Ghouta agricultural belt that has provided food to the city since ancient times.

Electricity was cut off in all four suburbs and gasoline stations were empty, activists said.

Across the country, at least 66 people were killed Sunday, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Activist groups reported nearly 250 deaths since Tuesday.

The official Syrian Arab News Agency said six soldiers were killed Sunday, but not in the suburban onslaught. They soldiers died in a bombing attributed to outside terrorists southwest of Damascus.

Ten other soldiers were killed when their convoy was attacked in the Jabal al-Zawiya region, along the Turkish border, the Syrian Observatory said.

The death tolls could not be independently confirmed.

The government's latest offensive came a day after the Arab League suspended a Syrian observer mission because of the intensifying violence, removing outside observers from around the country.

The observers were monitoring Damascus's compliance since Dec. 26 with an Arab League deal under which the Assad regime agreed to remove security forces from city streets, release political prisoners, allow free access to foreign journalists and human-rights workers and begin talks with political opposition groups.

The league said the regime largely failed to comply with the agreement.

League Secretary-General Nabil al-Araby arrived in New York Sunday to lobby the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution supporting an Arab peace plan that calls on Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down.

He was to be joined by Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, whose country heads the Arab League committee charged with overseeing Syrian developments.

The league plan, modeled on the solution to the government crisis in Yemen, calls for Assad to hand over power to Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa, leading to the formation of a unity government and then elections.

Syria, suspended from the league in November, has condemned the plan as "foreign interference."

The Security Council was expected debate the Syrian crisis this week, but Russia has said it will veto any resolution that threatens sanctions or calls for regime change.

Russian Foreign Minister Sunday called the Western-supported league plan for Assad to give up power "absolutely unforgivable."