by Jojo Malig, ABS-CBNnews.com
Posted at 03/07/2013 2:25 AM | Updated as of 03/07/2013 7:19 AM
BEIRUT (4th UPDATE) - Syrian rebels have seized a convoy of U.N. peacekeepers near the Golan Heights and say they will hold them captive until President Bashar al-Assad's forces pull back from a rebel-held village which has seen heavy recent fighting.
The capture was announced in rebel videos posted on the Internet and confirmed on Wednesday by the United Nations in New York, which said about 20 peacekeepers had been detained.
Al Jazeera English's Rula Amin, quoting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the captured peacekeepers are Filipinos.
The human rights monitoring group is in contact with the rebel brigade.
A highly-placed source in the diplomatic community told ABS-CBNNews.com Thursday morning that Observation Post 58, which is near where the peacekeepers were captured, belongs to the Philippine contingent's area of operations.
Neither the UN nor the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs have yet to disclose the identities or nationalities of the captured peacekeepers, as of posting.
Around 300 Filipino peacekeepers are deployed in the area as part of the 5-nation United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) in the Golan Heights, a mountainous region that Israel captured from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War.
The other nations that have UNDOF peacekeepers in the area include India, Canada, Japan, and Austria.
The seizure, the most direct threat to U.N. personnel in the nearly two-year-old uprising against Assad, came on the day that Britain said it would increase aid to the opposition forces and the Arab League gave a green light to member states to arm the rebels.
The regional Arab body also invited the opposition Syrian coalition to take Syria's seat at a League meeting in Doha later this month. Syria was suspended in November 2011 in response to its crackdown on protests which since spiralled into civil war.
The peacekeepers of the UNDOF mission have been monitoring a ceasefire line between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, captured by the Jewish state in a 1967 war, for nearly four decades.
Israel has warned that it will not "stand idle" as Syria's civil war spills over into the Golan region.
The United Nations in New York said its peacekeepers had been detained by around 30 fighters in the Golan Heights.
"The U.N. observers were on a regular supply mission and were stopped near Observation Post 58, which had sustained damage and was evacuated this past weekend following heavy combat in close proximity at Al Jamla," it said, referring to a village which saw fierce confrontations on Sunday.
In one rebel video, a young man saying he was from the "Martyrs of Yarmouk" brigade stood surrounded by several rebel fighters with assault rifles in front of a two white armoured vehicles and a truck with "UN" markings.
"The command of the Martyrs of Yarmouk...is holding forces of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force until the withdrawal of forces of the regime of Bashar al-Assad from the outskirts of the village of Jamla," the man, who was wearing civilian clothes, said.
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| Filipino peacekeepers deployed in the Golan Heights. Department of Foreign Affairs photo |
At least five people could be seen sitting in the vehicles wearing U.N. light blue helmets and bullet-proof vests.
"If no withdrawal is made within 24 hours we will treat them as prisoners," he said, accusing them of collaborating with Assad's forces to push the rebels out of Jamla.
Nearly two years since the uprising started, rebels are distrustful of a United Nations that they say has failed to support their cause.
UNSC demands peacekeepers' release
The UN Security Council on Wednesday demanded that Syrian rebel fighters release the abducted peacekeepers.
UN peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous said that negotiations were being held with the abductors.
The Security Council "strongly condemned the detention of a group of more than 20 peacekeepers," said a statement read by the 15-nation body read to reporters by Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin.
The statement added that the abduction was carried out "by armed elements of the Syrian opposition."
"The members of the Security Council demanded the unconditional and immediate release of all the detained UN peacekeepers and called upon all parties to cooperate with UNDOF in good faith to enable it to operate freely and to ensure full security of its personnel," added the statement.
The United Nations has set up a crisis cell to handle the emergency, diplomats said.
"Negotiations are going on and the matter is mobilizing all our teams," UN peacekeeping chief Ladsous said after briefing the Security Council on the abduction. "It is a very serious incident."
Syrian opposition fighters are also believed to be holding an UNDOF staffer who was announced missing on February 25. The staffer is also believed to be a Filipino.
Churkin said that the rebels have made demands but did not give details.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights distributed two statements by the rebel Yarmuk Martyrs Brigade claiming to hold the peacekeepers.
In one, a man identified as Abu Kaid al-Faleh, a spokesman for the brigade, said the peacekeepers would not be freed until Syrian regime forces pull out from the area.
"We call on them to withdraw all their troops to their bases. If they do not withdraw, these men (UN troops) will be treated as prisoners," he said.
In a second video, the same rebel accused the UNDOF of working with the Syrian army to try to suppress the insurgency and help regime forces enter the area.
"The Syrian regime, the UN and the European countries are all collaborators with Israel," he said.
"They all want the Free Syrian Army to leave this land. They want us to leave our land and they want the oppressor Bashar al-Assad to enter because they are collaborators with the Zionists, Israel and America," the spokesman said. - with reports from Reuters, Agence France-Presse
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