The head of the United Nations monitoring mission narrowly missed being the victim of a bomb attack near his convoy in Syria, seeing at first hand the failure of the ceasefire he is trying to implement.
Six Syrian soldiers that were accompanying the convoy escorting Major-General Robert Mood were injured yesterday (Wednesday) by the roadside bomb near the entrance to the city of Dera'a in southern Syria, where the uprising against the rule of President Bashar al-Assad began last year.
Opposition activists blamed the regime, in line with similar incidents, though without providing evidence. The rebel Free Syrian Army admits using light arms and rocket-propelled grenades, but denies bomb attacks.
However, activists claimed they killed seven members of the militia, known as the shabiha, in Damascus, a further sign of the conflict's descent into a lower-intensity but widespread insurgency since the monitors' arrival a month ago.
The head of the Free Syrian Army, Colonel Riad al-Asaad, threatened to increase military action despite the ceasefire. "We will not stand with folded arms because we are not able to tolerate and wait while killings, arrests and shelling continue despite the presence of the observers who have turned into false witnesses," he told Al-Sharq al-Awsat, a Saudi-backed newspaper.
