Syrian opposition activists said on Wednesday that security forces still had armoured vehicles stationed in city streets ready to act against protesters even though Arab League peace monitors said they had withdrawn. Opposition groups in the cities of Idlib in the north, central Homs and Deraa in the south said the army had hidden armour in dugouts and replaced tanks with blue armoured vehicles said to belong to police forces.
---- Arab League says monitors stem bloodshed, detainees freed
An Arab League mission arrived in Syria last week to verify whether the government was implementing a peace plan under which it had agreed to withdraw its military presence from restive areas and to release thousands of prisoners detained since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began last March.
League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby said in Cairo on Monday the monitors had reported back that state forces had withdrawn from residential areas. The mission was ensuring a halt to bloodshed and had secured the release of about 3,500 prisoners, he said. "We are not seeing the release of detainees or the true removal of a military presence from the streets," said Rami Abdelrahman, head of the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Videos uploaded by activists on the Internet showed armoured vehicles hidden behind high dirt barriers. "Nabil Elaraby, you are in Cairo and we're in Baba Amr. Here are the tanks and there are your monitors," said one activist in a video uploaded on the Internet which showed a team of orange-vested men who appeared to be League monitors standing near an armoured vehicle behind a barrier. Such footage is impossible for Reuters to verify and Syria has barred entry to most foreign journalists.
The Syrian government on Wednesday rejected accusations from Washington that it was failing to live up to its agreement with the Arab League. The mission is expected to report on its first week of work by end of this week. Activists said the monitors visited the main prison in Homs, a hotbed of protest.
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