AMMAN: Opposition parties are banned in Syrian under emergency law introduced in 1963. Although dozens of parties exist, decades of repression have forced them underground or into exile, leaving formal opposition weakened and fragmented.

Muslim Brotherhood:r Membership of the Muslim Brotherhood was made a capital offense in Syria in 1980. Two years later, the late President Hafez Assad put down an armed uprising by the Brotherhood in Hama. Human rights groups said at least 20,000 people were killed.

The group’s leader, Mohammad Riad Shaqfa says the Brotherhood seeks nonviolent democratic change to replace autocratic rule with a plural system where it can present an Islam-based manifesto to a free vote. It says it does not want an Islamic state.

Kurdish parties:r Kurdish groups have sought civic rights for Kurds, and won a pledge from Assad last week that tens of thousands of stateless Kurds would be granted citizenship.
But authorities have countered efforts to organize Syria’s minority Kurds into an effective political force by jailing Kurdish leaders and trying to appease their tribes.

Opposition figures in Syria:r Riad Turk is the leading opponent of the Baath Party’s monopoly on Syria’s political system. Turk has spent 25 years in jail, 17 in solitary confinement.

During the Damascus Spring, a period dominated by calls for democratic reform in 2000, Turk warned that Assad would not hesitate to use repression to crush democrats.
r Aref Dalial is a former dean of economics at Damascus University who has campaigned for decades for a democratic alternative to the Baath Party.

He was jailed from 2001 to 2008 after he criticized a cellphone concession granted to Assad’s cousin, tycoon Rami Makhlouf, who in the eyes of protesters is a symbol of corruption.
r Anwar al-Bunni is scion of a political family known for unflinching opposition to the Baath Party’s monopoly of power.

Bunni, a human rights lawyer from Hama, championed the cause of Syria’s political prisoners before being sentenced to five years in jail 2005.
r Haitham al-Maleh is a former judge who challenged the Baath Party takeover of the judiciary and professional unions.

Jailed for six years in the 1980s, Maleh was sentenced again last year but released last month.
r Ahmad Tumeh is a physician and respected civic figure from the province of Raqqa.
Tumeh was one of a group of 12 who were arrested in 2007 and jailed for two and a half years after they tried to revive the Damascus Declaration.

r Fawaz Tello was jailed five years for his role in the Damascus Spring. An engineer by training, Tello has been working quietly since his release in 2006 to further the cause of human rights in Syria and strengthen the democratic movement.

Opposition figures in exile: r Abdel-Halim Khaddam, a former vice president who quit and defected from the Baath Party in 2005, has called for the creation of a new constitution based on a parliamentary democracy.
But opposition figures distrust Khaddam because of his decades of service in the Baath Party.
r Rifaat Assad turned against his brother, Hafez Assad and lives in exile in Spain.
r Maamoun al-Homsi, a former member of Parliament and businessman now based in Canada, was jailed for five years in 2001 for taking part in the Damascus Spring.

Emerging figures in current protests:r Mouaz al-Khatib heads the independent Islamic Civilization society.
Seen as an enlightened religious figure, Khatib has moved to assure Syria’s minorities that the diversity of the country would be respected if Assad falls.

r Montaha al-Atrash is a leading member of the human rights organization Sawasiah. Her stature as daughter of Sultan Pasha al-Atrash, who led a revolt against French colonial rule, helped elevate her as a spokesperson for non-violent democratic change. She has publicly questioned official assertions that Assad was the only person qualified to rule Syria.

r Suheir Atassi played a key role in a March 16 protest in Damascus seeking the release of political prisoners and 15 children arrested in Daraa for writing revolutionary slogans on wall.
She was arrested by secret police and released earlier this month.