REPORT: Syria's Assad in rare visit as rockets hit capital

Syrian President Bashar Assad made a rare public appearance on Wednesday, visiting a Damascus power station, while two bombs exploded near the city center and wounded 15 people, Syria's state news agency reported.                        

SANA said the blasts were caused by two improvised explosive devices which went off on Khalid Bin Walid Street and the nearby Bab Mesalla Square. It said the bombs were planted by "terrorists," a term the government uses to describe rebels fighting to topple the Syrian leader.            

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights however said the Bab Mesalla explosions were due to rockets that fell in the area. It said initial information indicated that there were casualties, but the number could not be obtained immediately.            

Earlier, the National Syrian Coalition declared that the “Syrians and the Lebanese have heard nothing but threats and warnings as well as a confession of Hezbollah’s interference in the internal Syrian affairs.”                          

The coalition issued a statement A day after Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah warned of a possible intervention for Iran and Hezbollah in Syria to support the regime whereby it reiterated its call on the Lebanese government to control its borders and to immediately halt, by all means possible, all military operations carried out by Hezbollah in the regions near the Lebanese-Syrian borders.                     

On another note, Syria's United Nations (UN) ambassador said the use of chemical weapons was not only "a red line" but "a blood line" that cannot be tolerated, and on Tuesday once again demanded a UN investigation of an alleged chemical weapons attack in Aleppo that the government blames on rebels.                        

Bashar Ja'afari told a news conference on Tuesday that his government had bodies and other proof that chemical weapons were used in Khan al-Assad in Aleppo on March 19, and it wanted the incident investigated. The rebels blame the government for the attack.                        

Ja'afari said his government was also demanding details of another alleged chemical weapons attack that Britain and France claim was carried out in Homs in December before it will even consider allowing UN experts to conduct an investigation in that city.                

Ja'afari also claimed that "armed terrorist groups" spread a chemical material among people in Saraqeb, in northern Idlib province, as they were awaiting entry into Turkey late on Monday.                       

But activists in Saraqeb claimed the government bombed the town with chemical agents. It said the attack caused respiratory problems and other symptoms among some residents which they claimed were consistent with a chemical attack.                                  

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it was unable to confirm the purported use of chemical agents.                                   

But in response to the claims, Turkish border authorities decontaminated a group of wounded Syrians in a Turkish hospital. Turkish officials said staff wore protective equipment to treat them because some claimed they may have come under a chemical attack.                  

However, an aide to the governor of Hatay province told The Associated Press that there was no indication that chemical weapons were used against them and the hospital near the border with Syria soon returned to normal operations.                      

The aide spoke on condition of anonymity citing government rules that bar civil servants from speaking to journalists without authorization. 


REUTERS/AP

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