Mahmoud Issa picked up by security agents hours after government announced end to state of emergency, say Syrian activists
Syrian authorities arrested a leftist opposition figure at his home during an overnight raid, hours after the government announced an end to nearly 50 years of emergency rule, human rights activists said on Wednesday.
The head of the Syrian Human Rights League, Abdul-Karim Rihawi, said security agents picked up Mahmoud Issa from his home in the central city of Homs after an interview he gave to al-Jazeera late on Tuesday.
He said his "arbitrary arrest is in line with the state of emergency rule" and said he expected him to be released after President Bashar al-Assad signs the decree formally abolishing the emergency rule.
The reviled legislation, in place since Assad's ruling Ba'ath party came to power in 1963, gave the regime a free hand to arrest people without charge.
Despite its repeal, defiant anti-government protesters accuse Assad of buying time and clinging to power in one of the most repressive Middle Eastern regimes.
Rights activist Mazen Darwish said that in the satellite TV interview Issa angered relatives of a Syrian brigadier general who was killed with his two sons and a nephew on Sunday in Homs.
The government says they were shot by "armed gangs" that authorities blame for the violence during the anti-government protests of the past month.
Issa had told al-Jazeera he didn't know who was behind the killing and called for an investigation, enraging bereaved relatives who reportedly threatened him before alerting police, Darwich said. Issa, who has spent years in prison for his pro-democracy views, was held shortly afterward.
The anti-government protests that have shaken Assad's authoritarian regime. At least 200 people have been killed as the government cracks down on protesters.
Repealing the state of emergency, which gives authorities almost boundless powers of surveillance and arrest, was once the key demand of the uprising. But the protest movement has crossed a threshold, with increasing numbers now seeking the downfall of the regime.
The rejection by protesters of the lifting of emergency rule could pose a make-or-break moment for Assad, a British-trained eye doctor who took power 11 years ago but has failed to fulfil early promises of reform.