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US soldier who ‘fought with Syria jihadis’ is held.
Devika Bhat, Martin Fletcher and Heba Ghanem
Last updated at 12:11AM, March 29 2013
A former American soldier who travelled to Syria and allegedly joined an insurgent-linked rebel group has been arrested and charged with terrorism offences, the US said last night.
The arrest of Eric Harroun, a white American from Phoenix, Arizona, coincided with a mortar attack on the University of Damascas that killed at least 15 people and injured 20.
Mr Harroun allegedly joined a terror squad of fighters from the Jabat al-Nusra jihadist group, training to use rocket-propelled grenades against Syrian government forces.
The Justice Department said that Mr Harroun, who served in the US Army from 2000 to 2003, was charged with “conspiring to use a destructive device outside of the United States”. The offence carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
His arrest comes amid rising concern about the influence of extremist groups fighting in Syria alongside opponents to the Assad regime.
The attack on the university, where many westerners studied Arabic before the war, was the deadliest in a series of shellings that have shattered the relative calm of the capital almost daily.
There were also unconfirmed reports, accompanied by an inconclusive video clip, that the rebels had hit an Iranian military transport plane as it prepared to land at Damascus airport. Regime officials denied the reports, which appeared on the Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera satellite television stations.
The mortars hit the open-air cafeteria of the university’s architecture department in the Baramkeh district of Damascus. State television showed pictures of doctors trying to save the lives of victims amid broken tables and chairs, scattered books, shattered glass and pools of blood. Several of the wounded were said to be in a critical condition.
The regime blamed the “barbaric massacre” on “terrorists — the term it uses to describe rebel fighters. For months they have been fighting running battles with government forces in outlying parts of the capital.
The opposition would certainly appear to be responsible for other recent mortar attacks on President Assad’s seat of power, which have targeted Ummayed Square in the heart of official Damascus, Assad’s Tishreen Palace, and state security or media facilities.
Before yesterday, at least five people had been killed in central Damascus since Monday. “Because of the regular mortar attacks on Baramkeh and other areas in Damascus, residents no longer feel safe to walk in the streets or to go about their daily lives,” Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said.
However, it is now widely believed that the regime fired the missiles that hit halls of residence at Aleppo University in February, killing more than 80 people. The regime blamed that attack on the rebels too.
Elsewhere, the UN High Commission for Refugees expressed deep concern about reports that Turkey had sent hundreds of refugees back to Syria following clashes with military police over living conditions at the Suleymansah camp near the town of Akcakale on Wednesday.
Camp officials told Reuters that several hundred had been deported after they were identified by security cameras, but the Turkish Government denied that. It said 50 or 60 Syrians had chosen to return voluntarily to their homeland.
“Some people have returned... and yes, some of these may have been involved in the provocations from yesterday, but they returned of their own free will,” a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.
A riot also erupted at the Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan, but that one was provoked by the authorities’ refusal to let some Syrians take a bus home because of fighting across the border.
Israel’s military said that it was increasing its medical teams along the border because of the growing number of injured Syrians crossing into the Jewish state.
Source:Times.co.uk,BBC News,Huffington Post New York Times.
Devika Bhat, Martin Fletcher and Heba Ghanem
Last updated at 12:11AM, March 29 2013
A former American soldier who travelled to Syria and allegedly joined an insurgent-linked rebel group has been arrested and charged with terrorism offences, the US said last night.
The arrest of Eric Harroun, a white American from Phoenix, Arizona, coincided with a mortar attack on the University of Damascas that killed at least 15 people and injured 20.
Mr Harroun allegedly joined a terror squad of fighters from the Jabat al-Nusra jihadist group, training to use rocket-propelled grenades against Syrian government forces.
The Justice Department said that Mr Harroun, who served in the US Army from 2000 to 2003, was charged with “conspiring to use a destructive device outside of the United States”. The offence carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
His arrest comes amid rising concern about the influence of extremist groups fighting in Syria alongside opponents to the Assad regime.
The attack on the university, where many westerners studied Arabic before the war, was the deadliest in a series of shellings that have shattered the relative calm of the capital almost daily.
There were also unconfirmed reports, accompanied by an inconclusive video clip, that the rebels had hit an Iranian military transport plane as it prepared to land at Damascus airport. Regime officials denied the reports, which appeared on the Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera satellite television stations.
The mortars hit the open-air cafeteria of the university’s architecture department in the Baramkeh district of Damascus. State television showed pictures of doctors trying to save the lives of victims amid broken tables and chairs, scattered books, shattered glass and pools of blood. Several of the wounded were said to be in a critical condition.
The regime blamed the “barbaric massacre” on “terrorists — the term it uses to describe rebel fighters. For months they have been fighting running battles with government forces in outlying parts of the capital.
The opposition would certainly appear to be responsible for other recent mortar attacks on President Assad’s seat of power, which have targeted Ummayed Square in the heart of official Damascus, Assad’s Tishreen Palace, and state security or media facilities.
Before yesterday, at least five people had been killed in central Damascus since Monday. “Because of the regular mortar attacks on Baramkeh and other areas in Damascus, residents no longer feel safe to walk in the streets or to go about their daily lives,” Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said.
However, it is now widely believed that the regime fired the missiles that hit halls of residence at Aleppo University in February, killing more than 80 people. The regime blamed that attack on the rebels too.
Elsewhere, the UN High Commission for Refugees expressed deep concern about reports that Turkey had sent hundreds of refugees back to Syria following clashes with military police over living conditions at the Suleymansah camp near the town of Akcakale on Wednesday.
Camp officials told Reuters that several hundred had been deported after they were identified by security cameras, but the Turkish Government denied that. It said 50 or 60 Syrians had chosen to return voluntarily to their homeland.
“Some people have returned... and yes, some of these may have been involved in the provocations from yesterday, but they returned of their own free will,” a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.
A riot also erupted at the Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan, but that one was provoked by the authorities’ refusal to let some Syrians take a bus home because of fighting across the border.
Israel’s military said that it was increasing its medical teams along the border because of the growing number of injured Syrians crossing into the Jewish state.
Source:Times.co.uk,BBC News,Huffington Post New York Times.
