China blames West for failure on Syrian crisis

Syrian artillery, aircraft pound rebels in Aleppo

A man runs for cover during clashes between Free Syrian Army fighters and Syrian Army soldiers in the Salah al-Din neighborhood of central Aleppo August 4, 2012. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic

ALEPPO, Syria (Reuters) - Syrian artillery, planes and a helicopter gunship pounded rebel positions in Aleppo on Saturday, witnesses said, as President Bashar al-Assad's forces tried to break through the insurgents' frontline in Syria's largest city.

Syrian forces clashed with rebels around Aleppo's television and radio station, activists said, and a local rebel commander said his fighters were preparing for a "strong offensive" by government forces on the city.

In the capital Damascus, troops backed by armor stormed the last opposition bastion on Friday in a drive to crush a rebel offensive that coincided with a bombing that killed four of Assad's senior security officials. The onslaught continued on Saturday as jets bombarded the city, a resident said.

Syrian forces battered Aleppo's Salaheddine district, seen as a gateway for the army into the city of 2.5 million people. The fate of the district could determine the outcome of a conflict that has already claimed some 18,000 lives.

"There is one helicopter and we're hearing two explosions every minute," a Reuters witness said.

The civil war has intensified in the past few weeks, with fighting engulfing Damascus and Aleppo for the first time in the 17-month-old uprising against Assad family rule.

The two cities are crucial prizes for both sides in a conflict that has eluded all attempts at a diplomatic solution and risks igniting a wider conflagration.

U.N. member states on Friday voted overwhelmingly to condemn the Syrian government at a special session of the 193-nation General Assembly that Western diplomats said highlighted the isolation of Assad supporters Russia and China.

Western and Arab powers want Assad to step aside but Russia and China have used their Security Council vetoes to block attempts to force him out. They say outside interference is prolonging the bloodshed.

Assad's government, allied to Iran and Lebanon's armed Shi'ite Hezbollah movement, is at odds with Turkey and most of the Arab world, especially U.S.-aligned states such as Saudi Arabia and its Sunni-ruled Gulf partners.

EXPLOSIONS

In Salaheddine, rebels from the Free Syrian Army hid in alleyways, dodging the Syrian army's bullets and tank rounds that struck a building in the western district on Saturday.

Two fighter jets opened fire with cannon and smoke billowed from the district. A witness said: "We saw two fighter bombers that are each capable of carrying one bomb fly over the area of Salaheddine and then we heard two explosions."

Bullets zipped past residential buildings, as rebels took cover behind concrete blocks and makeshift sandbags and fired in the direction of Assad's forces.

One fighter fell to the ground after a bullet hit his chest. Fellow rebels dragged him into a car, leaving a trail of blood on the ground, to take him to the field hospital.

Explosions shook the shutters of abandoned shops and brought down a rain of concrete from buildings in Salaheddine.

A Syrian activist told Reuters the rebels had earlier sought to extend their area of control from the Salaheddine district, where the most intense fighting has been focused, northwards to the area around the television and radio station.

"The Free Syrian Army pushed from Salaheddine to al-Adhamiya where they clashed this morning with Syrian troops. But they had to retreat," the activist who identified himself as Barraa al-Halabi told Reuters.

A 19-year-old fighter called Mu'awiya al-Halabi, who was at the scene, said rebels entered the station but were driven out.

"The Syrian army sent snipers and surrounded the TV station and as soon as morning came, the army started shooting. One of our fighters was martyred and four were wounded," he said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which said 110 people had been killed on Friday, including 88 civilians, also confirmed the clash near the station.

SUPERIOR FIREPOWER

Syrian television said a large number of terrorists, the term it uses for the rebels, were killed and wounded after they tried to storm the television and radio station. It said the army had killed dozens of fighters in Hamadaniyeh, Sukkari and Salaheddine districts and that others had surrendered.

Earlier in the day, a local rebel commander in Aleppo said he expected a Syrian army attack on rebels "within days", echoing the head of the U.N. peacekeeping department, who said there had been a "considerable build-up of military means".

"We know they are planning to attack the city using tanks and aircraft, shooting at us for three to four days and they plan to take the city," Colonel Abdel-Jabbar al-Oqaidi said.

Faced with the Syrian army's superior firepower, Oqaidi said the rebels were counting on mass defections by government soldiers once the offensive started.

"At the moment the soldiers cannot leave their bases and they are too afraid to defect. Once they are inside our city they will take off their uniforms and join us," he said.

In Damascus, a resident in the Adawi neighborhood just north of the central Old City district, reported that jets had pounded an area of the capital on Saturday. "The bombardment has been continuous since 7 am (12 a.m. EDT) in Tadamun district. It hasn't stopped for a moment," said the resident.

On Friday Syrian forces stormed Tadamun, the rebels' last stronghold in the city.

Syrian television said on Saturday an armed terrorist group had committed a massacre in the Damascus suburb of Yalda, near Tadamun . The television station said 20 people had been killed. It was not immediately possible to verify the incident as Syria bars many foreign media from reporting inside the country.

Former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, who is quitting as international peace envoy for Syria, said on Thursday that Assad should step down. He urged Syria allies Russia, China and Iran to persuade him to embrace political transition.

A bus-load of 48 Iranian pilgrims were abducted by gunmen in Syria on Saturday, Iranian media reported, the latest in a string of kidnappings of visitors from the Islamic Republic.

(Additional reporting by Yeganeh Torbati in Dubai and Ben Blanchard in Beijing; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Pravin Char)

Iran tests short-range missile with new guidance system

Iranian Defense Minister General Ahmad Vahidi (R) walks in parliament in Tehran November 1, 2011. REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran has test-fired a new, more accurate short-range missile capable of striking land and sea targets, it said on Saturday, a show of strength that underscored its ability to hit shipping in the Strait of Hormuz if attacked.

Israel has said it is considering military strikes on Iran's nuclear sites if the Islamic Republic does not resolve Western fears it is developing atomic weapons technology, something Tehran denies.

Iran says it could hit Israel and U.S. bases in the region if it comes under attack. It has also threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, the neck of the Gulf through which 40 percent of the world's sea-borne oil exports pass.

"With the fourth generation of the Fateh 110, the armed forces of our country are able to target and destroy land and sea targets, enemy headquarters ... missile seats, ammunition sites, radars and other points," Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said in quotes carried by the official IRNA news agency.

The missile has a range of around 300 km (180 miles), meaning it could strike Iran's immediate neighbors and might also be able to hit Hormuz shipping, as well as energy facilities in Saudi Arabia and the U.S. fifth fleet in Bahrain.

Such moves would risk a military response from the United States.

"Using new guidance methods, target-striking systems were installed on the missiles and during the flight test ... its ability to hit the target without deviation was proven," Vahidi said, according to IRNA.

"In future programs, all future missiles built by the Defense Ministry will be equipped with this capability," he added.

Iran has made "robust strides" in developing its ballistic missile capabilities, the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies wrote in a 2010 assessment which also said that Iran's arsenal suffered from poor accuracy.

All of Tehran's ballistic missiles would be capable of carrying a nuclear payload, the IISS said.

Last month, Iran said it had successfully test-fired medium-range missiles capable of hitting Israel, and tested dozens of missiles aimed at simulated air bases.

It conducted what it called the "Great Prophet 7" missile exercises at the start of July as a European Union embargo on Iranian crude oil took full effect.

Those sanctions, in addition to measures against Iranian banks and U.S. efforts to persuade countries around the world to cut economic ties with Iran are aimed at forcing the Islamic Republic to make concessions on the nuclear work it says is for purely peaceful ends.

"The test firing of the missile is most likely to be a warning to the West and Iran's Persian Gulf neighbors that Iran too can escalate the level of tensions in the Persian Gulf area," said Meir Javedanfar, Iran expert at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel.

Bruno Gruselle, senior research fellow at the Foundation for Strategic Research in Paris, said any improvements in the accuracy of Iran's short-range missiles might be a precursor to better long-range ones.

"Fateh is a very short range guided rocket and a good platform to test improved guidance," he said. "They will have to take that to longer range systems which have very different mechanical constraints during their flight, but they will obviously work on that."

Vahidi said the missile was intended as a defensive weapon. "These capabilities are defensive and would only be used against aggressors and those who threaten the country's interests and territorial integrity," he said.

The former head of Israel's intelligence service Mossad Efraim Halevy on Thursday said on Israel Radio he "would be very worried about the next 12 weeks," if he were Iranian.

(Reporting By Yeganeh Torbati; Writing by Angus McDowall; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Syrian leader Assad's planes pound vital prize of Aleppo

A Free Syrian Army fighter reacts after his friend was shot by Syrian Army soldiers during clashes in Salah al-Din neighbourhood in central Aleppo August 4, 2012. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic

ALEPPO, Syria (Reuters) - President Bashar al-Assad's forces used artillery, planes and a helicopter gunship to pound rebel positions in Syria's biggest city, witnesses said, in a battle that could determine the outcome of the 17-month uprising.

After U.N. Security Council paralysis on Syria forced peace envoy Kofi Annan to resign last week, and with his ceasefire plan a distant memory, rebels were battered on Saturday by the onslaught they had expected in Aleppo and the capital Damascus.

"There is one helicopter and we're hearing two explosions every minute," said a Reuters witness in Aleppo, Syria's commercial hub.

Syrian forces struck at Aleppo's Salaheddine district, a gateway into the city of 2.5 million people that has become the frontline of an increasingly sectarian conflict that has killed some 18,000 people and could spill into neighboring countries.

A local rebel commander said his fighters were preparing for a "strong offensive" by government forces on the city.

In Damascus, jets bombarded the capital as troops kept up an offensive they began on Friday to storm the last rebel bastion there, a resident said.

Both cities - vital prizes in the battle for Syria - had been relatively free from violence during the 17-month uprising but fighting flared in Damascus after a July 18 bombing which killed four of Assad's inner circle and also erupted in Aleppo.

On Saturday, a rebel commander in Aleppo said he expected a Syrian army attack on rebels "within days", echoing the head of the U.N. peacekeeping department, who said there had been a "considerable build-up of military means".

"We know they are planning to attack the city using tanks and aircraft, shooting at us for three to four days and they plan to take the city," Colonel Abdel-Jabbar al-Oqaidi said.

TV STATION OFFENSIVE REPELLED

Rebels tried to extend their area of control in Aleppo from Salaheddine to the area around the television and radio station, but were pushed back by Assad's troops, an activist said.

Syrian television said a large number of "terrorists" were killed and wounded after they tried to storm the broadcaster.

After Annan's resignation, the U.N. General Assembly voted on Friday to condemn the Syrian government and criticize the U.N. Security Council's failure to agree tougher action, in a resolution that Western diplomats said highlighted the isolation of Assad supporters Russia and China.

Russia called the vote a "facade of humanitarian rhetoric" behind which Assad's foreign enemies were arming the rebels and worsening the violence that has elements of a proxy war between Sunni and Shi'ite Islam which could spill beyond Syrian borders.

Assad is a member of the Alawite faith, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated Syrian politics through more than 40 years of his family's rule in a country that has a Sunni Muslim majority.

The mostly Sunni Muslim Gulf Arab states and Turkey have called for Assad to go. Assad still has the backing of Shi'ite Iran and Lebanon's armed Shi'ite Hezbollah movement.

In Damascus, a resident in the Adawi neighborhood just north of the central Old City reported that jets had pounded an area of the capital on Saturday.

Syrian television said an armed terrorist group had committed a massacre in the Damascus suburb of Yalda. The television station said 20 people had been killed. It was not immediately possible to verify the incident as Syria restricts foreign media access.

A bus-load of 48 Iranian pilgrims were abducted by gunmen in Syria on Saturday, Iranian and Syrian media reported, the latest in a string of kidnappings of visitors from the Islamic Republic.

(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny in Beirut, Yeganeh Torbati in Dubai and Ben Blanchard in Beijing; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Robin Pomeroy and Sophie Hares)