REPORT: As Assad advances, Syria launches commercial airline

Syrian rebels pressed their offensive deeper into the coastal heartland of President Bashar Assad's Alawite sect on Wednesday, battling government troops backed by warplanes for control of at least two villages in the heavily wooded and mountainous terrain, activists said.    

Opposition fighters from conservative and hard-line Islamic groups, including the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front, launched their assault Friday on the northern stretches of Latakia province near the Turkish frontier. So far, they have seized a border crossing, and gained control of an outlet to the sea for the first time since Syria's uprising began three years ago.

A Latakia-based activist who identified himself as Mohammed Abu al-Hassan said rebels were hoping that the offensive in Latakia would draw more Syrian soldiers to the area, relieving some of the pressure on harried opposition fighters elsewhere in the country.         

On Wednesday, rebels were battling government troops in the Latakia villages of Qastal Maaf and Nabaain, activists said. Syrian military jets were conducting airstrikes around to try to push back the opposition fighters, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.    

Both villages are south of the Armenian Christian town of Kassab and the nearby border crossing, which rebels seized on Sunday.     

The government has acknowledged the fighting in Latakia near the border with Turkey.

On the coast, rebels captured a small, rocky strip known as Samra on Tuesday, according to activists.    

The activist Abu al-Hassan said the area could be used by rebels to smuggle weapons. He said the shoreline there at the foot of rocky mountains was used by smugglers for decades because of its close access to Turkey and the nearby presence of deep water.    

Shiite shrine

Islamist fighters from an al Qaeda splinter group bombed a large Shi'ite Muslim shrine in the eastern Syrian city of Raqqa, activists said.   

The mosque of Ammar bin Yassir and Oweis al-Qarni was once a destination for Shi'ite Muslim pilgrims from Iran, Lebanon and Iraq before it was taken over a year ago by Sunni rebels battling to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.   

One photo posted on Twitter on Wednesday under the heading "the pagan Iranian shrine" showed extensive damage to the exterior walls and roof of the site, a turquoise and white complex of domes and minarets centered around a tiled courtyard.   

Another picture showed concrete and twisted metal strewn on the street outside the mosque - built under Assad's rule with support from Shi'ite Iran - while another showed an interior wall that had collapsed inward.               

Ankara regards the tomb as sovereign Turkish territory under a treaty signed with France in 1921, when Syria was under French rule, and threatened earlier this month to retaliate for any attack on the mausoleum.   

President Abdullah Gul said on Sunday Turkey would defend the site in the same way it would defend any Turkish land. "However the motherland is protected, that place will be protected in the same way," he said.

Syrian airline

A new Syrian airline plans to start flights from the war-torn country in May, a company manager told Reuters on Wednesday, following months of gains on the battlefield by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.   

The launch of Kinda Airlines, a private company, illustrates how Assad has been able - in part - to weather the three-year conflict, securing the capital and areas of the Mediterranean coast even as rebels advance in the north and east.   

Esmail Sharaf, Vice Commercial Manager, told Reuters that Kinda Airlines will operate out of Damascus International airport and the coastal city of Latakia. It aims to fly to more than 10 destinations within a year, including the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Iraq, and "hopefully Lebanon and Jordan".   

He said the company had registered a Boeing 737-400 from Jordan Aviation and signed a contract for an Airbus 320 with Aeolus Air, a company registered in Gambia and with offices in the United Arab Emirates.   

Syria's civil war has killed over 140,000 people since it started in 2011 as a peaceful protest movement against four decades of Assad family rule. Rebels have taken several military airports and last year fired on Damascus International airport.   

Kinda Airlines' debut flight was first scheduled for January. It was delayed until April 1 and again, Sharaf said, until May 1 due to "documents that are not ready and some paperwork inside Syria."   

The startup has also had to deal with wide-ranging European Union, Arab League and U.S. sanctions on Syria. Syrianair has had to ground planes in the past when it was unable to buy new parts for its fleet.

"Sanctions are making it very, very difficult. Hopefully we have passed through all these difficulties," Sharaf said.   

Sharaf said Kinda Airlines' three main shareholders were all private Syrian citizens.


AP/REUTERS

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