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Updated, 18:32
THE TÁNAISTE Eamon Gilmore has condemned the killing of over 90 Syrian civilians, including dozens of children, in Syria.
Gilmore described Friday’s slaughter in Houda as a “deplorable act and a clear crime against humanity”.
“Those responsible need to know that the international community will insist on full accountability for such atrocities,” Gilmore said.
The Tanaiste and foreign affairs minister added that the regime of president Bashar Assad should immediately honour its commitment to withdraw all troops and heavy weaponry from populated areas.
The United Nations’ security council is meeting this evening to discuss the killings, a move supported by Gilmore. It is thought that Russia is seeking to hold up the release of any critical statements, however.
Assad’s government has denied that its troops were behind the attacks, blaming the killings on “hundreds of heavily-armed gunmen” who also attacked soldiers in the area.
Friday’s assault on Houla, an area northwest of the central city of Homs, was one of the bloodiest single events in Syria’s 15-month-old uprising. The United Nations says 32 children under the age of 10 were among the dead.
Though the UN and others have issued statements appearing to hold the Syrian regime responsible, all have stopped well short of suggesting intervention.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi told a news conference in Damascus that Syria is being subjected to a “tsunami of lies” on Houla. ”We categorically deny the responsibility of government forces for the massacre,” he said.
UN observers, among more than 250 who were dispatched in recent weeks to try to salvage the ceasefire plan, found spent artillery and tank shells at the site yesterday — a finding which could point toward the government’s heavily-armed mechanised units.
“Those who use violence for their own agenda will create more instability, more unpredictability and may lead the country to civil war,” the observers’ chief, major general Robert Mood, warned in a statement.
Giving the regime’s version of the events, Makdissi said “hundreds of heavily-armed gunmen carrying machine guns, mortars and anti-tank missiles” launched the attack simultaneously from several locations, starting about 2pm and continuing for nine hours.
He said five army positions in the area came under attack at the same time, leaving three soldiers dead and 16 wounded.
“There were no Syrian tanks or artillery in the vicinity” of Houla, Makdissi added, claiming that gunmen used anti-tank missiles and “Syrian troops retaliated in defense of their positions.”
“Children, women and other innocent people were killed in their homes, and this is not what the Syrian army does,” Makdissi said. “The method of killing was brutal.”
Makdissi said a committee was set up to investigate the incident, with its findings due within three days.
He added that international envoy Kofi Annan would return to Syria on Monday, though a senior Arab League official said Syria had already denied permission for Annan’s deputy to travel to Damascus.
An anonymous official said Syria had made the decision not to allow former Palestinian foreign minister Nasser al-Kidwa to travel, because it wanted to deal only with the UN and not with the Arab League.
Annan and al-Kidwa are joint envoy from both the UN and the Arab League, though Annan is seen to represent the UN and al-Kidwa the Arab League.
Additional reporting by Albert Aji and Bassem Mroue, Associated Press
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Another cover up incoming, either that or it’ll be dragged on so long there will never be a conclusion. Remember all the investigations into Fine gael donor Denis o Brien and Actavo/siteserv and the dealings and debt write offs he received from certain banks? Still ongoing about 5 years later!!
Evidence based? The poor girl was let down by incompetent staff. End of.
@Brian O’Connor:
I don’t think that it was the nursing staff who were to blame to be fair, didn’t one nurse repeatedly try to get her seen by a doctor?
@Costigan Family: i was myself waiting on several occasions in ED 16+ hours…. I am yet to see one busy nurse….try retail or hospitality…. Its the management thats fails miserably… Poor girl…. May she rest in heaven…
@Costigan Family: it is not the overworked doctors’ fault that the HSE is chronically underfunded. There are one thousand vacant consultant posts because of the crap conditions offered by the HSE.
We seem very likely to have a general election this year
I will vote for the party that pledges to fight the monster that is our state bureaucracy
From the department of “social protection” to the HSE these unfeeling blobs make life a misery for huge numbers of people most of whom are on low/modest incomes and in difficult circumstances
If the word “republic” is to have any meaning then the state should be on the side of citizens. Instead it seems to be constantly stonewalling or fighting its citizens in long expensive court cases.
Time for real meaningful change
@Gerry Kelly: We accept that the state is not competent enough to provide food for example (collectized farms never worked) or consumer good etc why oh why then do we think that public sector beauacrats can run a health care system. Long lines, scarcity, misallocation of resources, no accountability, service users being seen as a burden, or a nuisances-all of these things are a result of state beauacracy. The state can fund healthcare, ideally through social insurance, but I shouldn’t actually run the system. Healthcare can be delivered to a high quality without long waits e.g germany, Switzerland etc.
The people in the Midwest were promised a centre of excellence by the HSE when the a&e was closed in Ennis and Nenagh. Brendan Drumm, Mary Harney and every Minister and HSE CEO since have let the people down. Hang your heads in shame.
.. they just don’t care, not the first time or last time.. will happen again..
Do you want the truth or an enquiry?
Civil Servants do not appoint people to find truth.
I’m afraid to think what I would do if this was one of my family members.
@Paul Kavanagh: Could not agree more Paul. I cannot as a parent imagine begging, pleading for help for my child as she lay dying before my eyes.
If the ministry for health, the ceo of the hse and the ceo of the hospital involved had the slightest most minute shred of dignity they should have resigned the minute this appalling tragedy happened.
Like you said I would seriously consider taking matters into my own hands if this happened to my child.
The stardust case had a tribunal of inquiry in 1981 that was a cover up. In 2009 the government published a redacted re-edited report from Mr Paul Coffey however in 2017 after the retired Judge McCartan review he stated looking at the evidence both the Keane review and Coffey review were wrong.
I not surprised about the terms of reference because government refuses to own their fatal failures and deny natural truths and justice. Her family should walk away.
@Liam Foy: It was found in the enquiry that the two top doctors on the ward that night were more interested in broken bones and minor injuries than treating the most seriously ill, I do think that says it all! They should be demoted or struck off.
“There are insufficient doctors to care for the numbers and acuity of patients presenting in the timescale expected by the triage system, the hospital and the community”, the report stated. Blame management and the Minister for Health, not the overworked, burnt out, doctors.
I must say from my inter action with Medical Staff in a major Dublin hospital, the care has been fantastic.
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