BEIRUT (AP) — In the first attack to target a campaign
event, a mortar shell slammed into a tent packed with supporters of
President Bashar Assad, killing 39 people and wounding 205 others,
Syrian state TV said Friday. The shelling underscored deep fears in
government strongholds that rebels will escalate attacks in an attempt
to disrupt the balloting.
Assad is widely expected to win a third,
seven-year mandate in the vote scheduled for June 3, but the West and
opposition activists have criticized it as a farce since it is taking
place despite a raging civil war.
The 49-year-old president
himself has not made a public appearance in more than a month and was
not at the gathering struck by the mortar shell late Thursday in the
southern city of Daraa. But campaigning has begun in earnest, with
supporters waving his pictures and Syrian flags during daily
demonstrations in the capital, Damascus, the coastal city of Latakia and
other government-held areas.
Many gatherings have been held in so-called "election tents" where nationalistic songs are
played and supporters mingle.
State
TV showed pictures of Assad supporters dancing in a campaign tent in
Daraa. It then showed people lying dead and wounded on the ground,
including several children. Its toll was the first provided by the
government for the attack, which opposition activists earlier said
killed 21.
Ahmad Masalma, an opposition activist in Daraa, said
six such tents — festooned with posters of Assad and Syrian flags — have
been set up in the past week in the city, which holds special
significance as the birthplace of the uprising against his rule in March
2011.
He criticized the celebratory mood in the tents.
"They
have loud music and Dabka," he said, referring to a traditional
foot-stomping dance. "It’s very provocative and an insult to the blood
of martyrs."
He said and another activist who identified himself
by his first name, Ahmad, said rebels from a faction of the Free Syrian
Army umbrella group fired a single mortar shell at the tent in a
government-held area, after repeatedly warning civilians to stay away.
Daraa is divided into a rebel-held and a government-held sector.
He
said about 100 people, including members of pro-Assad militias,
officers and employees, were in the tent when it was hit in the Matar
district.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights,
which relies on activists on the ground for its reports, said at least
21 people, including 11 civilians, were killed.
Masalma said the attack "set the tent ablaze and sent shrapnel flying everywhere."
U.N.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the mortar attack and
reiterated his opposition to the indiscriminate use of any weapons by
any party against civilians.
Daraa’s Gov. Khaled al-Hannus
described the attack as a "massacre" and "a crime by terrorists meant to
prevent Syrians from taking part in the presidential elections."
Speaking on Syrian TV, he vowed Syrians will be undeterred and insisted "every honorable
citizen" in Daraa will vote for Assad.
Assad’s
family has ruled Syria for more than 40 years. Though this year’s vote
will be the first time the family has faced challengers as opposed to a
yes-or-no vote on their rule, a recently passed election law makes it
impossible for those leading the revolt against Assad to compete.
Rebels
trying to overthrow Assad frequently fire mortar shells into Syria’s
major cities, including the Damascus, from opposition-held suburbs.
But Thursday’s attack was the first to target an election event, raising security concerns for those
planning to vote.
Assad
was last seen in public on April 20 when Syrian state television
broadcast images of him visiting the ancient Christian village of
Maaloula, north of Damascus, after government forces recaptured the
village as part of a series of major advances.
On Thursday, Syrian
tanks backed by massive air power rolled into the grounds of a
sprawling prison in the northern city of Aleppo, breaking a yearlong
rebel siege and allowing Assad’s forces to close in on a nearby rebel
command center.
In a statement Friday, the U.N. High Commissioner
for Human Rights said "a number of prisoners and detainees, in
particular 53 political detainees, whose identity is known (to the U.N.)
are at imminent risk."
More than 160,000 people have been killed
in the fighting in Syria as the revolt morphed into a civil war that has
also sent millions fleeing for their lives and turned once-prosperous
cities into rubble-strewn warzones.
Reflecting fears of violence
breaking out in the run-up to the Syrian vote, Lebanese Interior
Minister Nouhad Machnouk has warned Syrian refugees against holding
rallies and gatherings within Lebanon.
More than 1 million Syrians
have sought shelter in Lebanon, straining the country’s resources and
threatening to re-ignite the tiny Arab nation’s own explosive sectarian
mix.