KUWAIT/ANKARA/ BEIRUT: Arab condemnation of Syrian authorities’ crackdown on the five month uprising intensified Friday with leaders in Kuwait, Turkey and Syria’s leading literary figure speaking out Friday.
In a sign of increasing impatience with Damascus, the Gulf state of Kuwait became the first Arab country to publicly denounce the deadly strategy of quelling pro-democracy protests, calling for dialogue and “true reforms” to end the crisis.

“The state of Kuwait expresses its extreme pain for the continued bloodshed among the brotherly Syrian people,” said a statement by a Foreign Ministry official cited by state news agency KUNA.
“Kuwait calls for dialogue and a political solution to allow implementing true reforms that meet the legitimate demands of the Syrian people away from the security actions,” said the unnamed official.

The statement came after continued protests and demands by MPs for the Kuwaiti government to condemn the military crackdown in Syria and to expel the Syrian ambassador.
Islamist MPs and their supporters held a rally late Friday in solidarity with the Syrian people despite scorching heat in the desert state.

Turkey’s foreign minister meanwhile denounced the Syrian crackdown on civilian protesters as “unacceptable” and “illegitimate,” Anatolia news agency reported, later confirming an earlier report that that Turkish authorities had intercepted an arms shipment from Iran to Syria.
“The developments in Syria as I emphasized before are unacceptable,” Anatolia quoted Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as saying.
“Operations with heavy arms and tanks in densely populated residential areas like Hama are not legitimate at all,” Davutoglu told reporters as he left a mosque after the Friday prayer in Ankara.

“Syria should take the messages from Turkey and the international community very seriously and put an end to this violent environment as soon as possible,” he said.
Davutoglu confirmed report published Thursday by German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung citing “Western diplomatic sources” as saying that Turkey had stopped a weapons delivery from Iran on its way to Syria which was believed to be destined for Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia.

He said a truck containing weapons had been intercepted and that an investigation had been launched.
Ankara, whose ties with Damascus have flourished in recent years, has stepped up pressure on President Bashar Assad to initiate reform but has stopped short of calling for his departure.

But Turkey is showing mounting frustration with his foot-dragging on democratic reform.
Prominent Syrian liberal poet and nobel prize nominee Adonis for the third time condemned the crackdown Friday, urging Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down, but also called on the opposition to adopt a strict secular ideology.

“President Assad should do something. If I were him, I would leave the presidency,” Adonis said in an interview with Kuwait’s Al-Rai newspaper.
“The least he can do is to resign from his post,” the Beirut-based secular intellectual said. Adonis’ given name is Ali Ahmad Said.

The poet criticized the opposition for being fragmented and dominated by religious groups, adding that the appropriate solution for Syria is to establish a civil state where religion and politics are separated.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday that she believed that Assad’s government was responsible for 2,000 deaths and repeated her assertion that the Syrian president had lost all legitimacy.