Syria troops bomb towns, EU grounds First Lady

EU on Friday agreed to sanction President Bashar al-Assad's glamorous British-born wife Asma, along with others.

DAMASCUS: Syrian forces bombed towns and clashed with rebels in several regions as activists said thousands staged anti-regime protests and the European Union slapped sanctions on the country's First Lady.

In Geneva on Friday, the UN Human Rights Council ordered a probe into violations in Syria to be extended, asking investigators to map out abuses since a deadly crackdown on protests in the country erupted in March 2011.

UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan was to travel this weekend to Moscow and Beijing, the two countries that have blocked Security Council action against Syria over the crackdown.

But he had no immediate plans to return to Damascus.

Adding to pressure on the regime, the EU on Friday agreed to sanction President Bashar al-Assad's glamorous British-born wife Asma, along with his mother, sister and sister-in-law.

Diplomats in Brussels said EU foreign ministers had agreed an assets freeze and travel ban on the four women and eight other members of Assad's entourage.

Asma Assad, whose parents live in Britain where she grew up, cannot be barred entry to the country, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said.

"But given that we are imposing an asset freeze on all of these individuals and a travel ban on other members of the same family and the regime, we are not expecting Mrs. Assad to try to travel to the United Kingdom at the moment."

Assad himself was targeted last May 10, along with his younger brother Maher and four cousins.

Washington welcomed the EU's decision.

"We are gratified that the EU has taken yet another step in tightening the noose on the Assad regime," US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced that Syrians in the United States would be allowed to stay beyond their visas and avoid the risk of returning to their violence-torn country.

"Conditions in Syria have worsened to the point where Syrian nationals already in the United States would face serious threats to their personal safety if they were to return to their home country," Napolitano said.

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators turned out Friday in the hot spots of anti-regime revolt across Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

At least 33 people were killed in violence nationwide, the Britain-based group said: 17 civilians, 13 soldiers and three army deserters.

Nine civilians died in districts in Homs hit by gunfire and rockets, it reported.

At least three deserters and a civilians were reported killed in fighting between regime forces and army deserters in Aazaz in the northern province of Aleppo near the Turkish border, the Observatory and activists said.

"Troops are bombing and helicopters flying overhead," activist Mohammed Halabi told AFP in Beirut by telephone from the province. The fighting had been going on since midday Thursday, he said.

Aazaz, strategically positioned on the road to neighbouring Turkey, is a supply route for Free Syrian Army rebels.

Fierce clashes also erupted mid-afternoon between soldiers and deserters in the villages of Haritan and Anadan, between Aleppo and Aazaz, Halabi said. The Observatory said two civilians were killed in Anadan.

Troops shelled the two villages after deserters attacked a convoy of tanks headed for Aazaz, the activist said.

The state news agency SANA reported "several terrorists" killed in the Sermin region of Idlib and said a bomb under a bridge had killed an army engineer in the Aleppo region.

Videos posted online by activists showed protests in the southern province of Daraa, birthplace of the revolt that monitors say has cost more than 9,100 lives.

UN human rights expert Yakin Erturk, meanwhile, told reporters in New York Friday that at least four Syrian brigadier generals had defected in recent weeks.

In diplomatic efforts to halt the bloodshed, the Security Council on Wednesday adopted a statement urging Assad and his foes to implement "fully and immediately" Annan's peace plan.

The initiative calls for Assad to pull troops and heavy weapons out of protest hubs, a daily two-hour humanitarian ceasefire, access to all areas affected by the fighting and a UN-supervised halt to all clashes.

Annan's spokesman said a team of technical experts had returned to Geneva after "three days of intensive talks with Syrian authorities on urgent steps to implement" the plan.

On Friday, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned against any attempt to circumvent UN authority.

"There's a need to eliminate any loopholes allowing (nations) to act in circumvention of the authority of the Security Council and use force without its approval," Medvedev told a European security conference in Moscow.

The Security Council still awaited a formal Syrian response on Wednesday's statement, but government daily Tishrin welcomed it.

Riyadh, Doha, Ankara "and other capitals which are enemies of Syria, and which wanted a military intervention... suffered a defeat on the international stage," it said.

The opposition Syrian National Council poured scorn on the UN statement, saying it would give the regime more time to continue killing its own people.