More than 1,000 people have been killed in clashes in the coastal provinces of Syria, according to one war monitoring group.
Reporting from Aleppo, Syria
Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Shara, appealed on Sunday for calm and for unity as he moved to reassure the nation after days of clashes that a monitoring group said had killed hundreds of people.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace,” he said from a mosque in Damascus, according to video that circulated online. “We call on Syrians to be reassured because the country has the fundamentals for survival.”
The violence erupted last week between fighters affiliated with Syria’s new government, headed by Mr. al-Shara, and those loyal to the ousted dictator Bashar al-Assad. Scores of civilians have been killed, according to two war monitoring groups, along with combatants on both sides of the conflict.
Mr. al-Shara’s remarks on Sunday came as fresh fighting was reported in the countryside of the coastal Latakia and Tartus Provinces. A spokesman for the Defense Ministry, Col. Hassan Abdul Ghani, told state media that government forces were combing the countryside for armed fighters loyal to the deposed Assad regime.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has monitored the Syrian conflict since 2011, said that government forces were attacking with drones, tanks and artillery on Sunday. In other areas, it said, government forces were searching for armed groups affiliated with the deposed regime’s military.
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