Fourteen security personnel of Syria’s new authorities and three armed men were killed in clashes in Tartus province when forces tried to arrest an official attached to the notorious Sednaya prison, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Clashes broke out on Wednesday in Tartus, the stronghold of ousted President Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite minority community, and an attempt to arrest a former prison officer, the Britain-based monitoring group said.
Syria’s new interior minister confirmed the deaths in a message on Telegram, and said 10 police officers were also wounded, which he called “remnants” of the Assad government. The minister vowed to punish anyone who dares “undermine Syria’s security or endanger the lives of its citizens.”
On Thursday, the new Syrian military leadership said it had launched an operation to push out the last pockets of support for Assad’s regime in the rural areas of Tartus, state news service SANA reported.
SANA said the operation had already succeeded in “neutralizing a certain number” of armed men loyal to the ousted president. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported several arrests in connection with Wednesday’s clashes.
Wednesday’s The deadly incident comes as demonstrations and an overnight curfew elsewhere marked the most widespread unrest in Syria since the killing more than two weeks ago, raising fears of sectarian violence in the 13-year-long civil war. Went.
The demonstrations occurred at around the same time as an undated video was circulated on social media showing a fire inside an Alawite shrine in the city of Aleppo.
The Interior Ministry said on its official Telegram account that the video was from the rebel attack on Aleppo in late November and that the violence was carried out by unknown groups, and said that whoever was now circulating the video was trying to incite sectarian unrest. Was doing.
In the city of Homs, Syrian police imposed an overnight curfew, state media reported, after clashes linked to protests there that residents said were led by members of the minority Alawite and Shia Muslim religious minorities.
One protester was killed and five others were injured in Homs “after security forces opened fire to disperse the crowd”, Agence France-Presse reported, video from the Alawite shrine Protests had erupted due to this.
Some residents told Reuters the demonstrations were linked to pressure and violence against members of the Alawite minority in recent days.
Syria’s new ruling administration, led by the Sunni Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the curfew. State media said the curfew was being imposed for one night, from 6 p.m. local time (1500 GMT) until 8 a.m. Thursday.
The Observatory reported demonstrations by thousands in Tartus and Latakia, also an Alawite stronghold, as well as in other areas including Assad’s hometown of Kardaha.
It was the largest protest by Alawites since the fall of Assad on December 8, and it came as hundreds of Syrians protested against the burning of a Christmas tree in the capital, Damascus.
The country’s new leaders have repeatedly vowed to protect minority religious groups, who fear former rebels now in control might try to impose a conservative form of Islamic government.
In a predominantly Alawite neighborhood of Damascus, Alawite Sheikh Ali Derer told Reuters on Thursday that homes were vandalized and people were beaten based on their religious identity, despite promises from HTS that the community would be treated respectfully. . He accused “third parties” of trying to incite discord.
Citing several incidents of people being beaten at a checkpoint, Derir said the community had extended its hand to the new government, but “there have been many violations”.
An HTS fighter in the area said there was an incident on Thursday in which Alawites were taken off a bus and beaten because of their religion, but he denied that HTS was responsible.
Assad’s longtime regional ally, Shia-majority Iran, has criticized events in Syria in recent days. Syria’s newly appointed Foreign Minister Assad Hassan al-Shibani said earlier this week that Iran should respect the will of the Syrian people and Syria’s sovereignty and security.