Syrian deadline expires, Arab League calls for UN help

The Arab League is to discuss further economic sanctions on Syria The Arab League deadline for Syria to sign a protocol allowing in observers to monitor rights in the country has passed. The deadline was set for 1100 GMT .
The League will now press ahead with plans to impose economic sanctions, according to Egypt's envoy to the regional bloc.
The sanctions could include a suspension of commercial flights to Syria and a halt to dealings with its central bank, Afifi Abdel Wahab said in Cairo on Thursday.
Long resistant to drawing the international community into the Syria crisis, the League agreed to ask UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon "to take all measures to support the efforts of the Arab League to resolve the critical situation in Syria."
 As the deadline loomed, activists called for a new day of anti-regime protests, urging demonstrators to flood the streets nationwide after the main weekly Muslim prayers in support of dissident army officers.
"The free army protects us," said a message on the Facebook page of the Syrian Revolution 2011, one of the key motors behind more than eights months of protests seeking to unseat the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
"The free army is the guardian of our peaceful revolution," it said, in reference to the rebel Free Syrian Army which has claimed numerous attacks on regular troops in recent weeks.
Abdel Wahab said that if Syria did not sign, foreign ministers would meet again on Sunday to review the proposed sanctions.
His comments came after members of the Arab League convened in Cairo to discuss the escalating crisis in Syria in the wake of President Bashar Al-Assad's refusal to end his crackdown on anti-government protestors.
Syria depends on its Arab neighbours for half or its exports and a quarter of its imports.
"If that is to happen, it will be very unfortunate because the damage will be to all sides," Economy Minister Mohammed Nidal al-Shaar told AFP in an exclusive interview.
"We don't expect all Arab countries to yield or participate in sanctions," he added. "In fact, we are almost certain that some Arab countries will not participate," he said.
Last week, Walid Al-Muallem, the Syrian foreign minister, said the planned mission placed "impossible conditions" and gave the 500-member monitors' team too much authority that infringed on Syria's sovereignty.
In the run-up to Thursday's meeting, Lebanon said it would not endorse any potential sanctions against Syria.
"Lebanon will not endorse any sanctions by the Arab League against Syria," Adnan Mansur, the Lebanese foreign minister, told a local radio.
"We will decide whether to vote against or abstain depending on the talks in Cairo."
Protestors have been rallying against Assad's one-party rule since March, braving the much-criticised security crackdown.
At least 51 people were killed in violence across Syria on Thursday, including 23 regular army soldiers and 15 deserters, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Thirteen civilians also died, 12 of them in the flashpoint protest hub of Homs, the group said.
The LCC also said that 401 people have died in November alone at last count, including 27 children.
The Observatory also said heavy machine gun fire blasted the city of Rastan following a one-hour clash early on Thursday between soldiers and army defectors.
The UN says more than 3,500 people, most of them civilians, have been killed since the start of the uprising.
Members of the Syrian opposition have been meeting world leaders, urging further action against Assad's government.
Russia called for more information about a French call for the international community to set humanitarian corridors to protect civilians fleeing the violence in Syria.
According to Lebanon's Daily Star, foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich told a weekly news conference, "I think we will return to this question when more clarity emerges about what specifically is being discussed."
According to the International Crisis Group, Syrian activists and defected soldiers are already setting up safe havens for civilians. "There no longer is a permanent loyalist military presence in parts of Idlib, Hama and Homs governorates, a situation that enables the armed opposition to further regroup and organise. The governorates of Dayr Zor and Deraa appear on the verge of following a similar path. As defections mount and the army is under ever greater stress, there is reason to doubt that the regime can muster sufficient military resources to reverse the trend. Talk about creating safe-havens on the Turkish and Jordanian borders could soon be moot; in many ways, Syrians appear on their way to doing that on their own," said the report.
Alain Juppe, the French foreign minister, met leaders of the opposition Syrian National Council on Wednesday, describing the exiled group as "the legitimate partner with which we want to work".
Juppe said France would also seek EU backing for humanitarian corridors in Syria "to alleviate the suffering of the population".
However, he ruled out the possibility of military intervention to create a "buffer zone" in the north of the country.
International pressure has been mounting on Syria, with the UN General Assembly's Human Rights Committee condemning the crackdown in a vote on Tuesday.
The resolution, drafted by Britain, France and Germany, received 122 votes in favour, 13 against and 41 abstentions.
Arab states that voted for it included co-sponsors Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, as well as Egypt.
Russia and China, which vetoed a European-drafted resolution that would have condemned Syria in the UN Security Council last month, abstained.
Bashar Jaafari, the Syrian ambassador to the UN, said the resolution had no meaning for his country and portrayed it as a US-inspired political move.
"Despite the fact that the draft resolution was basically presented by three European states, however it is no secret that the United States of America is ... the main mind behind the political campaign against my country," he said.
"This draft resolution has no relevance to human rights, other than it is part of an adversarial American policy against my country."

As Friday's death toll swelled, the head of the Free Syrian Army, Riyadh al-Asaad called for foreign air strikes on "strategic targets" in Syria to speed up the fall of the regime.
"We are not in favour of the entry of foreign troops as was the case in Iraq but we want the international community to give us logistical support," Colonel Asaad, told AFP.
"We also want international protection, the establishment of a no-fly zone, a buffer zone and strikes on certain strategic targets considered as crucial by the regime," he said in a telephone interview from Turkey.
According to the FSA chief, the rebel force now has 20,000 men in its ranks and is growing by the day.
The group claimed its men ambushed a military bus on Thursday killing seven military pilots and their driver.