Syrian forces use raids to take down activists

BEIRUT, Lebanon – Syrian security forces detained dozens of opposition activists and fired from rooftops in a seaside town Sunday as authorities turned to pinpoint raids after days of bloodshed brought international condemnation and defections from President Bashar Assad’s regime.

The strategy, described by a rights activist, appeared aimed at rattling the opposition’s leadership and showing that the state’s ability to conduct arrest sweeps has not changed despite abolishing nearly 50-year-old emergency laws last week.

The rising level of violence – more than 120 people dead since Friday – brought calls from the watchdog group Human Rights Watch for a U.N. inquiry. But Sunday’s tactics also suggest a government effort to head off the round of protest marches.

The police raids, which began late Saturday, concentrated around the capital, Damascus, and the central city of Homs, a hotbed of demonstrations against Assad’s authoritarian rule, said Ammar Qurabi, head of the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria.

“These people are not being arrested in a legal way. They are being kidnapped,” Qurabi said, claiming the plainclothes security agents did not have formal arrest warrants.

Qurabi did not have full figures for those detained but said at least 20 people were arrested in Homs. A resident in the Damascus suburb of Douma said at least five people were taken into custody and authorities cut Internet and telephone lines.

Later, security forces moved into the coastal town of Jableh, claiming they were searching for weapons, Qurabi said. He cited witnesses saying that police and army units opened fire from rooftops even though there were no apparent threats and no protests in progress. At least one person was killed and three wounded, he said.

The accounts could not be independently confirmed because Syria has expelled journalists and restricted access to trouble spots.