Update on Syria

Since March 2011, demonstrations throughout Syria have been violently suppressed by Syrian security forces. In late November, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said that the death toll had reached more than 4,000.

Some of the Syrian army and military have defected and joined the protest movement calling for an end of the government of President Bashar al-Assad. There are concerns that the country might be heading for civil war.

In November, after al-Assad reneged on an earlier agreement brokered by the Arab League to stop the violence against civilians, economic sanctions by the Arab League nations went into effect. Arab League Nations, Turkey, EU nations, the US and several other nations have frozen Syrian assets, restricted trading and instituted other sanctions on Syria.