UN Says Syrian Town Has 'Stench Of Bodies'

5:20am UK, Friday June 15, 2012
UN observers have visited al Haffa town in the province of Latakia and reported that nearly all government buildings have been burned down.

The UN Supervisory Mission in Syria said observers in Haffa reported finding it all but deserted with a strong stench of dead bodies and almost all government institutions gutted from the inside.

Sky's Tim Marshall, who is in Syria, said the observers had also found many cars burned, including police cars.

The observers were escorted into the town by government forces.

The news comes a day after Syrian authorities said the area had been "cleansed" of rebel fighters.

On Wednesday, rebels were said to have withdrawn from the besieged town and nearby villages that had been under intense regime shelling for eight days.

The UN statement said "a strong stench of dead bodies was in the air and there appeared to be pockets in the town were fighting is still ongoing."

It went on: "Most government institutions, including the post office, were set on fire from inside.

"Archives were burnt, stores were looted and set on fire, residential homes appeared rummaged and the doors were open."

It said the number of casualties was still unclear.

State television said the observers had "inspected the vandalism and destruction wrought by the terrorists."

The UN and opposition activists had expressed fears of a massacre if pro-government forces entered the town, just 10 miles from Assad's hometown of Qardaha.

Meanwhile in Damascus, a suicide bomber blew up a vehicle near an important Shi'ite shrine, killing himself and wounding 14 others, state media and witnesses said, as 35 people were reported killed across the country.

"If the target was because of its location, that's a very worrying vision of the future where each side targets the other," Marshall reported.

"We've seen it in Iraq and Syrians are praying they don't see it here."

Most of Syria's 22 million population are Sunni Muslims, while its minorities include Alawites, an offshoot Shi'ite community to which President Bashar al Assad belongs.

Official news agency Sana said the vehicle exploded in a garage 50 metres from Sayyida Zeinab shrine.

The windows of the mausoleum were shattered and its air vents ripped out by the blast, which left a three-metre crater. Tiles on the minarets were damaged.

International peace envoy Kofi Annan has warned that Syria's nearly 16 months of deadly unrest could turn into all-out sectarian war.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims, mainly from Syria's ally Iran, travel each year to the shrine of Sayyida Zeinab, a granddaughter of Muhammad, in an area of south Damascus that is home to many Iraqi refugees.

As the death toll soars, Amnesty International has accused Syria of committing crimes against humanity to punish communities supporting rebels.

The human rights organisation called for an international response after claiming it had fresh evidence that victims, including children, had been dragged from their homes and shot dead by soldiers, who in some cases then set the bodies on fire.

"This disturbing new evidence of an organised pattern of grave abuses highlights the pressing need for decisive international action," said Amnesty's Donatella Rovera on the release of the 70-page report entitled Deadly Reprisals.

The group interviewed people in 23 towns and villages and concluded that government forces and militias were guilty of "grave human rights violations and serious violations of international humanitarian law amounting to crimes against humanity and war crimes."

Foreign Secretary William Hague has urged Russia and Iran to use their "full influence" over Syria to achieve a peaceful end to the bloody uprising.

Mr Hague met his Russian and Iranian counterparts in Kabul during a conference on Afghanistan.