UN suspends syria monitoring as violence rages

DAMASCUS - A number of attacks occurred across Syria on Saturday, claiming the lives of at least two people, state-run SANA news agency said, as the UN supervision mission suspended its operations indefinitely due to the continuous violence.

A suicide car bomb went off near popular market in central Hama province, killing a policeman and injuring a number of law-enforcement agents and six civilians, said SANA.

Separately, armed groups assassinated a physician in eastern Deir al-Zour province, said SANA, adding that the assassination came as part of the armed groups' tactics targeting the community.

Members of the United Nations observer mission in Syria are seen at a hotel in Damascus, June 16, 2012. [ Photo/Agencies]

Meanwhile, a booby-trapped pickup truck was remotely detonated near a governmental building in northern Aleppo province, said SANA, causing material losses estimated at about 40 million Syrian pounds.  

SANA also reported that the Syrian authorities thwarted on Saturday three infiltration attempts by armed groups from Lebanon and Turkey.

Pro-government Facebook pages reported heavy clashes between the government troops and armed opposition overnight Saturday in central Homs province, a main hotspot in Syria's 15-months-old bloody crisis.

Syria's mainstream media said the authorities raided armed groups hideouts in the outskirts of Damascus Saturday, killing an assistant to a leader of al-Qaida-inspired al-Nusra group, which has claimed responsibility for several bombings in Syria.

On the opposition side, the activist network, Local Coordination Committees, said as many as 77 people were killed across Syria Saturday, 43 of whom were reportedly killed in suburbs of the capital Damascus. Activists accused government troops of being behind the killings. Yet their report cannot to be independently checked.

The Syrian government and the opposition blame one another for the daily grind of violence, which has worsened recently, pushing the UN supervision mission to Syria to announce the suspension of its activities indefinitely.

The Syrian government said it understands the UN's decision and blamed armed groups of hindering and undermining the mission since its very beginning in April.

Ahmad Haj Ali, a political expert, said the UN mission has been facing two challenges since the beginning: the first is a lack of effective ways to control the armed groups in Syria, and the second is insufficient means to properly protect the observers.

Ali told Xinhua that the observers have found themselves caught in the middle between the internal danger and the external pressures that point to the failure of the cease-fire truce from the very beginning.

Members of the United Nations observer mission in Syria are seen at a hotel in Damascus, June 16, 2012. [Photo/Agencies]