17 Killed Amid Massive Syria Protests

Arab League FMs Postpone Emergency Meeting

At least 17 people were killed today, apparently all civilian protesters, as another Friday of massive demonstrations took over the streets of Syria, with reports of over 200,000 rallying, mostly in the city of Homs.

The central theme of the protests today was condemning the Arab League for its repeated promises of action to resolve the situation and its ultimatums, which have repeatedly passed without any deals in place.

And as if to prove their point, the Arab League announced that its latest “emergency meeting” on Syria, which was supposed to be held tomorrow, has been postponed indefinitely. No reason was given for the latest delay.

In early November it looked as though the Arab League was going to help resolve the situation, with a deal in place to send international monitors and broker talks on major reforms. The monitors never arrived, however, and the talks have yet to even be scheduled as violence soars in the nation.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.