UNITED NATIONS - UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan has put the Syrian government and opposition on notice: the year-long conflict must end at 6:00am local time on April 12 if the government meets the agreed April 10 deadline to end its military operations.
Annan, a former UN Secretary-general who was speaking via video link from Geneva, told the 193-nation UN General Assembly that he was urging "the government and the opposition commanders to issue clear instructions so that the message reaches across the country, down to the fighter and soldier at the local level."
During the Council's deliberations, the Pakistan delegation, fully backed Kofi Annan's mission which it regards as the only mechanism that could lead to a peaceful settlement of the year-long crisis, and remained opposed to undertaking punitive measures.
In his remarks, Annan said, "We must silence the tanks, helicopters, mortars, guns and stop all other forms of violence too - sexual abuse, torture, executions, abductions, destruction of homes, forced displacement and other abuses, including on children." Annan addressed the assembly after the 15-nation Security Council increased the pressure on Syria by unanimously adopting a presidential statement endorsing next week's deadline and warning Damascus of "further steps" if Syria did not meet the deadline, which the Syrians have publicly accepted.
Kofi Annan said that Syria had claimed it has started a partial withdrawal of troops from three cities but that "alarming" casualties were still being reported in the country. "The Security Council calls upon the Syrian government to implement urgently and visibly its commitments ... to a) cease troop movements toward population centres, b) cease all use of heavy weapons in such centres, and c) begin pull back of military concentrations in and around population centres," the statement said. The council also urges Damascus to "fulfil these in their entirety by no later than April 10, 2012."
AFP adds: The United States on Thursday warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to respect a UN-backed April 10 deadline to end his "horrible" crackdown or face further international pressure. Echoing assessments made at the United Nations, State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the US saw no signs that Assad's forces were complying with the peace plan to pull out troops and guns from protest cities.
Meanwhile, at least 38 people, half of them civilians, were killed in violence across Syria on Thursday, monitors said, with fierce fighting between regime troops and insurgents in the rebel provinces of Idlib and Homs. In central Homs province, army shelling of the town of Rastan killed four civilians, including two children, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
In Homs city itself, eight regime forces were killed and dozens wounded in fighting with rebel forces on the outskirts of the Deir Baalaba neighbourhood, the Britain-based monitoring group said.
Four civilians were also killed in Homs city, including three stabbed by Shabiha pro-regime militia, the Observatory added.
Separately, regime troops backed by tanks stormed Douma, near Damascus, at dawn amid heavy gunfire and shelling.
Clashes between soldiers and rebel forces were reported in various parts of Douma, some 13 kilometres (seven miles) northeast of the capital, with a civilian killed by sniper fire, the Observatory said.
Plumes of smoke could be seen near the city's main mosque as troop reinforcements were sent in.
Two young men were killed in Kfar Sousa, a neighbourhood of Damascus early on Thursday when security forces opened fire on their car.
In the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, meanwhile, at least eight civilians were killed, along with six regime forces, the Observatory said.
Clashes were also reported in several towns in nearby Aleppo province, including Andan and Hritan, where messages on loudspeakers urged regime troops to defect and join the opposition.
Five soldiers were killed in two separate attacks there and in southern Daraa, cradle of the revolt that broke out in March last year against President Bashar al-Assad's regime, the Observatory said.
The unrest in Syria has left more than 9,000 people dead since mid-March last year, according to UN figures.
The revolt against the regime began as a popular uprising but has transformed into an insurgency that many fear will lead to a full-blown civil war.