AMMAN/BEIRUT: Syrian forces killed four villagers Wednesday in an expansion of a military campaign to crush dissent, as the West continued to sharpen its rhetoric against President Bashar Assad.

The four were killed in tank-backed assaults on at least four villages in the Jabal al-Zawya region in Idlib Province near the border with Turkey, an activist in Idlib and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
“We are seeing a military escalation following the regime’s political escalation,” the activist, who declined to be identified, told Reuters by phone.

He was referring to the arbitrary arrests of thousands of Syrians that intensified in the last two weeks, according to human rights campaigners, despite the authorities convening what they described as a “national dialogue” conference composed mostly of Assad supporters.

Syrian security forces arrested at least 30 people, including an actress and a writer, during a pro-democracy protest in Damascus Wednesday, the Observatory said.
This month, singer Ibrahim Qashou was found dead in the Orontes river in Hama with his throat slit, residents said, after he composed a song titled “Assad leave,” which was repeated by hundreds of thousands of protesters in the city.

The attack recalled assassinations of Assad family critics in the 1980s. The body of Lebanese journalist Selim al-Lawzi was found with his hand dipped in acid in Lebanon.
The Arab League of Human Rights head said security forces wielding batons dispersed 250 intellectuals and writers in Damascus’s Midan district Wednesday as they gathered, sang the national anthem and chanted “God, Syria, Freedom.”
Four people were arrested, said Abdel Karim Rihawi.

In the eastern province of Deir al-Zor, two explosions hit two minor gas pipelines, residents said. The official state news agency said a pipeline had caught fire due to either dry weather conditions or a leakage in the line.
International powers, including Turkey, have cautioned Assad against a repeat of massacres from the era his father, the late President Hafez Assad, brutally crushed leftists and Islamist challenges to his rule.

France, which with other European governments has been circulating a draft resolution at the Security Council for months only to see it blocked by veto-wielding permanent members China and Russia, said Wednesday it was vital the U.N. take action over Assad’s deadly crackdown on dissent. “It is indecent because Bashar Assad has mobilized incredible resources to neutralize his opposition,” said Defense Minister Gerard Longuet.

“Countries … like China … and Russia must accept common rules – one does not deal with one’s opposition with cannon fire,” he told the LCI news channel.
The Arab League meanwhile said Washington overstepped its bounds by saying Assad had lost the legitimacy to lead his country.

The U.S. said late Tuesday that Assad had “lost legitimacy” for failing to lead a democratic transition, but stopped short of explicitly calling on him to step down.
Speaking to reporters in Damascus, Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby said Assad assured him that “Syria has entered a new era and is now moving on the road of a genuine reform.” Elaraby said nobody has the right to say that the president of any country has lost his legitimacy.
“This issue is exclusively decided by the people,” he said after meeting Assad.

The growing numbers of protesters have breathed new life into Syria’s once decimated opposition. A meeting of Syrian opposition in Istanbul ended Wednesday with a call for the army to protect its people and side with the protesters.
Attended largely by exiled dissidents, the gathering will be followed by another in Istanbul Saturday which the organizers hope to twin through video-link with a “National Salvation” conference planned by opposition in Damascus.

Among the participants was an old man who had been a symbol of resistance to Assad’s father almost half a century ago. Barely able to walk without assistance, former leader of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Issam al-Attar declared Assad’s government to be a dying regime.

Also Wednesday, Syria’s Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said he regretted Monday’s attacks by government supporters on the U.S. and French embassies in Damascus.
“Whoever did that was wrong,” Moallem said, adding that Syria was responsible for protecting the embassies and their staff “and we bear full responsibility for that.”
Hundreds of Syrian government supporters smashed the embassies’ windows and spray painted walls with graffiti. Three French Embassy workers were injured.

Britain’s Foreign Office said it summoned the Syrian ambassador over the attacks. Sami Khiyami was called in over the raids, which were apparently sparked by the American and French envoys visiting the city of Hama, a flashpoint for protests against Assad’s regime.
Patrick Davies, the head of Near East and North African Department at the Foreign Office, “reiterated the U.K.’s condemnation of these attacks,” the statement said.