Syrian President Bashar al-Assad vowed on Thursday to "live and die" in Syria, rebuffing pressure to step down and leave the country, Reuters reported.
His vow comes against a background of mortar shells landing in neighboring countries and the new challenges for the Syrian opposition looking to overthrow his regime.
Here's the latest news on the Syrian opposition in the ongoing civil war.
Assad nixes possible offer for safe exit
Though British Prime Minister David Cameron had suggested on Tuesday that foreign exile might be a potential exit strategy for Assad, the leader quickly dismissed the offer.
"I am not a puppet. I was not made by the West to go to the West or to any other country," the Syrian president told Russia Today in an interview. "I am Syrian; I was made in Syria. I have to live in Syria and die in Syria."
Opposition leaders under pressure
Despite electing new leadership at the behest of its supporters the United States, the Syrian National Council is being criticized for taking too long to unite and for freezing out women in leadership roles, according to the Associated Press.
Opposition backers Qatar and Turkey in particular were annoyed by the behind-the-scenes squabbling by the rebels. Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani told the Syrian opposition in a closed-door session, "Come on, get a move on in order to win recognition from the international community," as reported by Reuters.
At the conference that took place in Doha on early Thursday, female delegates rushed the podium to protest the failure of promoting any women to the 41-member decision-making group. Delegate Muna Jondy, an immigration lawyer from Flint, Mich., noted that "the bottom line is that there is a recognition that the women got shafted, and that it has to be fixed," according to the AP.
Mortar lands in Israeli-occupied Golan Heights village
A separate Reuters report indicated that a mortar bomb fired from Syria landed in the Golan Heights on Thursday. No one was harmed and there was no damage.
Three Syrian tanks crossed over the border and into the demilitarized zone in the Golan Heights on Saturday, prompting Israel to call for action from the United Nations Security Council. Israel's army chief Benny Gantz warned that the "Syrian issue" could soon "become our issue" if matters continued to escalate.
Shawn Humphrey is a former contributor to The Flint Journal and an amateur Africanist, focusing his personal studies on human rights and political issues on the continent.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/president-assad-live-die-syria-201300882.html
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