Syria agrees to peace deadline

The government of Syria has agreed to an April 10 deadline to partially implement a plan to end violence in the country, UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan reportedly told the UN Security Council on Monday.

Diplomats said Annan asked the 15-nation council to support the deadline, which would include a full cease-fire within 48 hours. The peace plan includes a freeze on Syrian troop movements toward dissident cities and a halt to the use of heavy weapons.

The Assad regime had said it would accept the peace plan but did not initially specify when. Meanwhile fighting has continued, and at least 18 people were killed in Syria on Monday.

Annan also urged the Security Council to "begin consideration of deployment of an observer mission with a broad and flexible mandate," an anonymous diplomat quoted by Reuters news agency said.

Russia, which has vetoed two UN Security Council resolutions seeking to end the violence, has remained resistant to increasing international pressure on Assad. However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on a visit to Armenia on Monday that it was Assad's government that "must take the first step and start the troop withdrawal in line with Kofi Annan's plan."

ICRC lobbies Damascus on cease-fire

Annan's statement comes as the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross traveled to Damascus to meet government ministers about humanitarian aid.

Jakob Kellenberger's two-day trip to Syria was to include visits to areas hard-hit by the year of fighting between dissidents and government forces. He said he would lobby the regime of President Bashar al-Assad to establish a daily two-hour humanitarian cease-fire, which is part of the UN peace plan, to allow aid workers to reach the wounded and deliver supplies.

"I am determined to see the ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent expand their presence, range and scope of activities to address the needs of vulnerable people," Kellenberger's statement said.

To arm or not to arm

Western and Arab nations have given almost universal support to Anna's peace plan, but they remain divided on how to support the Syrian opposition. While a summit in Istanbul on Sunday of the pro-opposition "Friends of Syria" sought to present a unified stance on supporting the rebels, it stopped short of endorsing pleas from some rebel groups for weapons.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Monday that arming the opposition "would lead to a potentially dangerous proliferation of weapons in the region."

The issue of arming the rebels also divided an Arab League summit in Baghdad last week, where Qatar and Saudi Arabia - both advocates of supporting the rebels militarily - snubbed the conference by sending lower-level envoys instead of their heads of state.

A representative of the opposition Syrian National Council said on Monday that some Arab countries had already pledged arms to the rebels, but he implied that the exchange would take place in secret.

"The Free Syrian Army will be armed by some friendly countries, but this will not be done in the open and will be very soon," SNC member Sheikh Anas Airout told the DPA news agency. "Arming the rebels is essential, because if they do not, then this regime will continue to kill the innocent people of Syria."

acb/ncy (AFP, Reuters, dpa)