U.N. monitors shot at on way to Syria “massacre” site

Posted on June 7, 2012 by 4NR0
By: Erika Solomon and Louis Charbonneau

U.N. monitors came under fire on Thursday as they tried to check reports of a massacre of at least 78 villagers by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said.

Ban condemned the “unspeakable barbarity” of events in Mazraat al-Qubeir, while U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton again demanded that Assad cede power and leave the country.

Opposition activists said up to 40 women and children were among those killed in the Sunni Muslim village near Hama on Wednesday, posting film on the Internet of bloodied or charred bodies.

“There was smoke rising from the buildings and a horrible smell of human flesh burning,” said a Mazraat al-Qubeir resident who told how he had watched Syrian troops and “shabbiha” gunmen attack his village as he hid in his family olive grove. “It was like a ghost town,” he told Reuters by telephone, asking not to be named because he feared for his safety.

http://mar15.info/2012/06/u-n-monitors-shot-at-on-way-to-syria-massacre-site