Red Cross says negotiating halt to fighting in Syria to take aid

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) told Reuters on Monday that it was negotiating with Syrian authorities and opposition fighters on a "cessation of fighting" to bring life-saving aid to civilians hardest hit by the conflict.
   
Diplomatic sources told Reuters that the Geneva-based ICRC, the only international agency deploying aid workers in Syria, is seeking a two-hour cessation of hostilities in hotspots including Homs.
   
"The ICRC is exploring several possibilities for delivering urgently needed humanitarian aid. These include a cessation of fighting in the most affected areas to facilitate swift Syrian Arab Red Crescent and ICRC access to the people in need," chief ICRC spokeswoman Carla Haddad told Reuters.

Fifteen people were killed across various Syrian regions, nine of which died in Homs, human rights activists reported on Monday.

Meanwhile, China's main newspaper accused Western countries of stirring civil war in Syria and two Iranian warships docked at a Syrian naval base, underscoring rising international tensions over the near year-long crisis.

A Syria-based activist reported that three columns of army reinforcements including tanks are heading toward the restive central city of Homs.

Mustafa Osso says the regime appears to be preparing to storm rebel-held neighborhoods in the city before a referendum is held Feb. 26 on a new constitution.         

Osso told The Associated Press Monday he does not think the regime will be able to retake Homs through military force as residents plan to fight until "the last person."        

His comments came as the government kept up shelling of the rebel-held Baba Amr neighborhood of Homs. It has been under assault for more than two weeks.         

Activists in the western city of Hama said troops, police and militias had set up dozens of roadblocks, isolating neighborhoods from each other.
 
"Hama is cut off from the outside world. There is no landlines, no mobile phone network and no internet. House to house arrest take place daily and sometimes repeatedly in the same neighbourhoods," an opposition statement said.

Government troops extended their control on Hama after an offensive last week that concentrated on northern neighborhoods on the edge of farmland that have provided shelter for Free Syrian Army rebels.

The rebel fighters have been attacking militiamen, known as shabbiha, while avoiding open confrontations with armored forces that had amassed around Hama.

Government forces also maintained their siege of pro-opposition neighborhoods of Homs, south of Hama on the Damascus-Aleppo highway. Opposition activists reported sporadic morning shelling of Baba Amro district.

Security forces also mounted a campaign of arrests and raids in two suburbs of Deraa city and loud gunfire was heard, activists said. The reports could not be independently verified.
 
Meanwhile, female activists that were detained a few days ago by Syrian security forces from the office of human rights activist Mazen Darwish in Damascus have been released today, a human rights activist reported on Monday.    
Security forces arrested 14 activists on Thursday, including Darwish, the office’s head, after breaking into the Syrian Center for Media and Free Expression.

The Monday actions followed a weekend which saw one of the biggest demonstrations yet in the capital as the pro-democracy uprising against Assad's 11 year-rule neared its first anniversary.
  
AP/LBCI/Reuters