Continued shelling of Homs kills up to 50 people

The “shabbiha” (Assad’s militiamen) broke into three houses overnight on Tuesday and killed a family of five, a family of seven, and another family of eight, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).

The Syrian authorities have not commented on the report, and it cannot be verified because of the tight restrictions on journalists operating in the area.

Rami Abdulrahman, a dissident in exile and SOHR director, said that the overnight attacks occurred in districts of Homs where loyalist forces have been advancing after heavy bombardment of the city over the last few five days.

The mass killing and continued shelling of Homs comes after the Russian Foreign Minister Segei Lavrov met with President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus, who assured him of a “cessation” of violence.

The shabbiha are acting as if they are at the peak of their power and that they can do anything to prevent the Assad regime from falling. Rami Abdelrahman, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights

However Homs on Tuesday night endured its heaviest shelling yet in five days.

At Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday, David Cameron called the bloodshed in Homs “appalling, adding that Russia should look at its conscience.

Britain will be playing a big part in engaging opposition groups inside and outside Syria, he said, as well as “bringing together the strongest possible international alliance through a contact group, so that we can coordinate our efforts with respect to getting rid of this dreadful regime”.

Nearly 50 people died on Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning, according to activists.

“Electricity returned briefly and we were able to contact various neighbourhoods because activists there managed to recharge their phones. We counted 47 killed since midnight,” Mohammad Hassan told Reuters.

He said anti-Assad Sunni Muslim neighbourhoods were the focus of the most recent bombardment.

Mr Abdelrahman said the names of the families murdered in Homs were Ghantawi, Tirkawi and al-Zamel. Online sources suggest that the Zamel family were trying to escape the shelling when they were rounded up with the other families and shot in the al-Quahar street which separates two areas where the opposition has strong control.

“The shabbiha are acting as if they are at the peak of their power and that they can do anything to prevent the Assad regime from falling,” Mr Abdelrahman said.

Read more: Who are the Assads?

Medicine as a “weapon”

Also on Wednesdy, the international medical humanitarian organisation Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) accused the Syrian regime of conducting a campaign of repression against the wounded and the medical workers trying to treat them.

While MSF cannot work directly in Syria, it has collected testimonies from wounded patients treated outside the country and from doctors inside Syria.

“The security services attack and destroy the mobile hospitals,” said one doctor did not want to be named. “They enter houses looking for drugs and medical supplies.”

In Syria today, wounded patients and doctors are pursued and risk torture and arrest at the hands of the security services. Medicine is being used as a weapon of persecution. Marie-Pierre Allié, MSF president

The testimonies point to a crackdown on urgent medical care provision for people wounded in the ongoing violence in Syria.

“In Syria today, wounded patients and doctors are pursued and risk torture and arrest at the hands of the security services,” said Marie-Pierre Allié, MSF president. “Medicine is being used as a weapon of persecution.”

Previous family killing

On 27 January, Alawite shabbiha militiamen killed 14 members of a Sunni family in Homs in one of the worst sectarian attacks since the 11 month uprising began, activists and residents said.

Among the 14-strong Bahader family were eight children, aged eight months to nine years old, all of whom were shot or hacked to death in a building in the mixed Karm al-Zeitoun area, they said.

Sectarian killings have been alleged in Homs, and staunch Sunni Muslim districts have been the main target of a large-scale offensive by Assad’s forces that began on Monday.

Members of the Alawite sect have also been killed also by Sunnis opposed to President Assad who have taken up arms in the city.