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Dozens killed in attacks on security offices in Syria UN decries Homs attacks as an effort to 'spoil' Syrian peace talks
(about 7 hours later)
Insurgents have stormed heavily guarded security offices in the central city of Homs, killing a senior officer and at least 31 others, Syrian state media and officials have reported. A United Nations peace envoy has said a militant attack in Syria was a deliberate attempt to wreck peace talks in Geneva, while the warring sides appeared no closer to actual negotiations.
The swift, high-profile attacks were claimed by an al-Qaida-linked insurgent coalition known as the Levant Liberation Committee. A Syrian lawmaker on a state-affiliated TV station called it a “heavy blow” to Syria’s security apparatus. Suicide bombers stormed two Syrian security offices in Homs, killing dozens with gunfire and explosions, including the head of military security, prompting airstrikes against the last rebel-held enclave in the western city.
The attacks came as Syrian government and opposition delegates meet in Geneva in UN-mediated talks aimed at building momentum toward peace, despite low expectations of a breakthrough. The UN envoy to Syria, Staffan de Mistura, called the attacks tragic. “Spoilers were always expected, and should continue to be expected, to try to influence the proceedings of the talks. It is in the interest of all parties who are against terrorism and are committed to a political process in Syria not to allow these attempts to succeed,” UN mediator Staffan de Mistura said in a statement.
“Every time we had talks or a negotiation, there was always someone who was trying to spoil it. We were expecting that,” he said. De Mistura has met the two sides separately in Geneva while he tries to get agreement on how talks to end the six-year-old conflict should be arranged.
Syria’s ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar Jaafari, who leads Damascus’s delegation to the peace talks in Geneva, said the attacks were a message from the “sponsors of terrorism” to the peace talks. He has warned not to expect any quick breakthrough and to beware of letting the violence derail any fragile progress, as happened repeatedly in the past. A ceasefire brokered by Russia and Turkey with Iran’s support is increasingly being violated by both sides.
Activists said the city was on high alert after the attacks, with government troops blocking roads and forcing shops to close. The jihadist rebel alliance Tahrir al-Sham, which opposes the talks – although it has fought alongside factions that are represented there – said that five suicide bombers had carried out Saturday’s attack. It celebrated with the words “thanks be to God” but stopped short of explicitly claiming responsibility.
The government responded with an intense airstrike campaign against the only neighbourhood on the city’s outskirts still under opposition control, as well as other parts of rural Homs. Tahrir al-Sham was formed this year from several groups including Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, which was formerly known as the Nusra Front and was al-Qaeda’s Syrian branch until it broke formal allegiance to the global jihadi movement in 2016.
The assault early on Saturday was the most high profile in the city, which has been the scene of repeated suicide attacks since the government regained control. After the meeting with de Mistura, the Syrian government’s lead negotiator Bashar Jaafari spoke to reporters and repeatedly demanded the opposition condemn the attacks or face the consequences.
The head of military intelligence services, Maj Gen Hassan Daeboul, who was killed in Saturday’s attack, had been transferred from the capital to Homs last year to address security failures in the city, according to local media reports at the time. “If anyone refuses to condemn this terrorist attack then he is an accomplice of terrorism and we will deal with them accordingly,” Jaafari said.
The governor of Homs province, Talal Barzani, told Associated Press there were three blasts in total, killing more than 32 people. He said the attackers were wearing suicide belts, which they detonated in the security offices. The two agencies are 1.2 miles (2km) apart, and according to activists from the city they are heavily guarded, and have security cameras. He ruled out leaving the talks, saying he would meet de Mistura again on Tuesday, but he implied that some of the opponents that he had sat face-to-face with at Thursday’s opening ceremony were “sponsors of terrorism”.
According to state-affiliated al-Ekhbariya TV, at least six assailants attacked the two security compounds in Homs adjacent to the al-Ghouta and al-Mahata neighbourhoods, clashing with security officers before at least two of them detonated explosive vests. It was not clear if there are any civilians among the casualties. Warplanes also carried out six raids on Douma in the eastern suburbs of Damascus, resulting in six deaths, and earlier, an air raid in Hama killed four people from the same family, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.