More than 7000 massacred in Syria

7,000 Christians and Alawites have been “slaughtered” in Syria according to Greek Member of the European Parliament, Nikolas Farantouris, a member of the European Parliament’s Committee on Security & Defense, who visited Damascus on 8-9 March.

SYRIZA MEP Nikolas Farantouris has returned from the Syrian capital, where he met with religious leaders, including Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X of Antioch and the Near East, and officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the new regime in Damascus.

His visit over the weekend coincided as the forces of the Turkish-backed Islamist regime horrifically massacred Alawites and Christians, including Greek Orthodox, with the death poll being placed at over 7,000.

“Reliable data indicate 7,000 Christians and Alawites slaughtered and unprecedented atrocities against civilians. Christian and other communities with a millennial presence in this region are at risk of extinction,” Farantouris  said in a statement following his visit.

“The new Islamic regime is leading Syria into an Islamic state and is pretending that it cannot control the paramilitaries and the gangs associated with them who attack innocent civilians,” he continued, adding that Patriarch John X made an appeal “to stop the bloodshed, while in our private meeting he pointed out the tragic shortages of food and medicine that Christians are facing.”

“I call on the Greek Government and the governments of [EU] Member States, to act now. Neither Greece nor the EU can continue to show tolerance and be limited to ceremonial visits and courtesies with the Islamic regime for investments and ‘business’ while thousands of civilians are being slaughtered with its acquiescence, if not its guidance. Measures must be taken here and now before it is entirely too late,” the MEP concluded.

The massacres over the past few days was the worst violence to hit Syria since the fall of the Assad regime in December.

Interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose Islamist group led the offensive that toppled Assad, alarmed by the international outrage has attempted to distance himself from the violence 

and vowed to “hold accountable, firmly and without leniency, anyone who was involved in the bloodshed of civilians”.

“There will be no one above the law and anyone whose hands have been stained with the blood of Syrians will face justice sooner or later,” he said.

However, amid international outrage, the new Syrian regime has also urged the Turkish-backed Islamist fighters under its control to stop recording the violence and massacres in an attempt to hide their crimes.

In a statement on official news agency SANA, defense ministry spokesman Hassan Abdul Ghani said security forces had neutralized security threats and “regime remnants” in Latakia and Tartus provinces on the Mediterranean coast. Much of the violence against Alawites and Christians civilians has been under the guise of ending leftover pockets of Assad loyalists, but it has been documented that the elderly, women and children were murdered.

Also read  Destroying and Dismembering Syria | Defend Democracy Press

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