U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday that a new surge in attacks by Syrian government forces on protest cities violates the U.N. Security Council’s united demand for a peaceful end to the conflict.

The U.N. secretary general indicated that he believes Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is using an April 10 deadline to pull troops and heavy weapons away from cities as “an excuse” to step up killing.

Ban deplores the assault by the Syrian authorities against innocent civilians, including women and children, despite the commitments by the government of Syria to cease all use of heavy weapons in population centers,” said U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky.

“The April 10 timeline to fulfill the government’s implementation of its commitments, as endorsed by the Security Council, is not an excuse for continued killing,” Ban added.

“Such actions violate the consensus position of the Security Council” which backed the peace plan drawn up by U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan and the April 10 deadline he agreed with Assad, he said, according to Nesirky.

Ban said he was “gravely concerned” at the worsening humanitarian crisis in Syria. “The latest reports of growing numbers of refugee arrivals in neighboring countries are alarming,” he said.

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu informed Ban about a new surge in refugee arrivals in a telephone conversation on Thursday night, the U.N. spokesman said.

The U.N. Security Council, including China and Syria’s staunch ally, Russia, on Thursday unanimously adopted a so-called “presidential statement” endorsing the deadlines for an end to the Syria conflict and warning Damascus it would consider “further steps” if it failed to live up to its commitments.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Syrian protesters took to the streets on Friday under fire from regime forces, who pressed their campaign to pound rebel cities into submission, activists said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 35 people were killed, including 11 in the flashpoint central province of Homs and the same number in the Aleppo region of northern Syria.

Twenty-two of those killed were civilians, it said, while nine soldiers and four deserters also lost their lives.

The latest violence came a day after another 77 people were reported killed.








(Reuters)