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U.N. Council Strengthens Panel Investigating Abuses in Syria Aleppo Fight Intensifies, as U.N. Warns of Rising Flow of Refugees
(about 1 hour later)
GENEVA — Amid unrelenting conflict and reports of new massacres in Syria, the United Nations’ human rights body voted on Friday to strengthen and extend the term of the commission gathering evidence of abuses that could provide a basis for future prosecution by national or international courts. BEIRUT, Lebanon — A day after rebel fighters in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo announced a major offensive, the government and its opponents reported heavy fighting on Friday in the city, which has been ravaged by months of a brutal but inconclusive battle.
 The United Nations Human Rights Council voted to continue the work of the Commission of Inquiry for another six months and to increase its staff and resources. This was understood to include the appointment later Friday of two more commissioners to join the two already on the panel. The council also called on the panel to continue its efforts to map gross human rights abuses committed since March 2011, when the uprising began, and to report back in March of next year. The battle stepped up just as the United Nations and humanitarian agencies warned that the number of Syrians fleeing to neighboring countries could surge past 700,000, far exceeding earlier estimates.
Rebels said they had seized the mufti of Dara’a, the southern city where the uprising began, and forced him to leave Syria for Jordan because he had refused to join them. Antigovernment activists accused security forces of rounding up and detaining scores of civilians, including children, who had fled fighting near Damascus, the capital, and taken shelter in United Nations-run schools in a refugee camp for Palestinians.
Calls from Aleppo’s mosques declaring a new offensive on Thursday afternoon were followed on Friday by street demonstrations outside several mosques and attacks by hundreds of rebel fighters on multiple fronts, according to members of the rebel Tawhid Brigade, who said in online videos that the battle would be “decisive.”
In response to the unrelenting conflict and recent reports of new massacres in Syria, the United Nations’ human rights body voted on Friday in Geneva to strengthen and extend the term of the commission gathering evidence of abuses that could provide a basis for future prosecution by national or international courts.
 The agency, the United Nations Human Rights Council, voted to continue the work of the Commission of Inquiry for six more months and to increase its financing and its staff members. Later Friday, the council’s president announced the appointment of two more commissioners to join the two already on the panel, which is trying to map abuses committed since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in March 2011.
 The resolution, presented by Morocco on behalf of a group of Arab countries, won the backing of 41 of the council’s 47 members. It was opposed by China, Cuba and Russia. Three other members, including India, abstained. The resolution, presented by Morocco on behalf of a group of Arab countries, won the backing of 41 of the council’s 47 members. It was opposed by China, Cuba and Russia. Three other members, including India, abstained.
 Russia, saying that cooperation with Arab countries was a “strategic priority,” complained that the panel had been one-sided, prematurely blaming the Syrian government for the massacre at Houla and failing to report on other abuses. China also voted against the resolution on the grounds that “putting pressure on one party to the conflict will not help to solve the problem.”     Russia, saying that cooperation with Arab countries was a “strategic priority,” complained that the panel had been one-sided, prematurely blaming the Syrian government for a massacre at Houla in May and failing to report on other abuses. China also voted against the resolution, saying, “Putting pressure on one party to the conflict will not help to solve the problem.”    
 The commission told the council this month that it had collected “a formidable and extraordinary body of evidence” of war crimes and crimes against humanity, committed by Syrian government forces and militia and, on a lesser scale, by the rebels, including summary executions. The evidence includes the names of individuals and units responsible for alleged crimes, which have been sent to the United Nations’s human rights chief for use in any future prosecutions, the panel said. It was unclear on Friday afternoon how significantly the level of violence in Aleppo had risen, but both sides reported fierce battles. The government news agency SANA said rebels had attacked an agricultural facility and mounted an offensive in the Sheik Maksoud neighborhood. The government “inflicted heavy losses upon terrorists,” its term for rebels, SANA reported. The army also fought “terrorist groups” outside a kindergarten and a forensic medical center near Aleppo’s old city, SANA said.
 The fighting in the capital, Damascus, and the northern city of Aleppo is presenting the panel with more reports of atrocities to investigate. Among the latest are accounts of a massacre in the Damascus suburb of Thiyabiya, where activists say at least 40 people died on Wednesday; video showed bodies of people that appeared to have been summarily executed. Rebels claimed that members of a Kurdish faction that has historically been allied with the Syrian government against Turkey had battled government opponents in at least two provinces on Friday, underscoring the volatile mix of conflicting agendas within Syria, where the government has tried to position itself as the protector of the country’s many minority groups. While the rebels have some Kurdish support, and demonstrations have taken place in Kurdish areas, they have struggled to convince various Kurdish factions that their interests will be protected in a post-Assad Syria.
Paulo Pinheiro, the Brazilian investigator leading the panel, has already called for further investigation of a massacre in the town of Daraya in late August, where government forces and militia members appear to have killed more than 100 people. Brig. Bashir al-Hajji, commander of the Tawhid Brigade, said in an interview via Skype that during heavy fighting in the Sheik Maksoud district, fighters from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party joined the government side, and were urged by the rebels to lay down arms rather than join “a losing battle.”
 To bolster the investigations, the Human Rights Council’s Uruguayan president, Laura Dupuy Lasserre,  was due on Friday to announce two more commissioners. Such appointments would bring in additional legal and other experts to reinforce the panel’s research into international crimes and human rights abuses. The Syrian government has supported the party, known by its acronym, P.K.K., against Turkey, in part to deflect tensions with its own restive Kurdish population. Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq straddle the region populated by the stateless Kurds.
 Panel investigators have not been allowed to enter Syria, whose government has rejected their reports as politically biased and inaccurate, but they are in Turkey and Jordan, interviewing refugees who have fled the conflict. In Qamishli, a northeastern Syrian province heavily populated by Kurds, P.K.K. members were acting on Friday as shabiha, or pro-government militias, according to a Kurdish antigovernment activist who gave his name as Salar. He said P.K.K. members were assaulting protesters in front of a mosque after Friday Prayer, breaking the loudspeakers, firing shots into the air and threatening that “next time they will be shooting directly at chests,” the activist said.
 The Human Rights Council has already forwarded the panel’s findings to the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, but authority to refer the evidence to the International Criminal Court in The Hague lies with the United Nations Security Council, which is paralyzed by the rift between Western governments, which are urging action to halt the fighting, and Russia and China, which have used their veto powers to block it. The fighting is presenting the Commission of Inquiry with more reports of atrocities to investigate. Among the latest are accounts of a massacre in the Damascus suburb of Thiyabiya, where activists say at least 40 people died on Wednesday; video showed bodies of people who appeared to have been summarily executed.
The commission told the Human Rights Council this month that it had collected “a formidable and extraordinary body of evidence” of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Syrian government forces and militias and, on a lesser scale, by the rebels, including summary executions. The evidence includes the names of individuals and units responsible for alleged crimes, the panel said.
 The Assad government has barred the panel from working in Syria, but it has researchers in Turkey and Jordan collecting the testimony of Syrians fleeing the conflict.
Paulo Pinheiro, the Brazilian investigator leading the panel, has called for its findings to be taken up by the United Nations Security Council as the only body with the authority to refer the evidence of human rights crimes to the International Criminal Court for prosecution.
  

Anne Barnard and Hwaida Saad reported from Beirut, and Nick Cumming-Bruce from Geneva. Hania Mourtada contributed reporting from Beirut.