Flow of arms to Syria fueling violence: UN rights chief

UN human rights chief Navi Pillay says the flow of arms into Syria is “fueling the violence” in the Arab country, calling for an end to the militarization of the ongoing conflict.

Pillay did not specify where the arms are coming from, but UN diplomats believe that Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been supplying weapons to the armed Syrian rebels.

“Any further militarization of the conflict [in Syria] must be avoided at all costs,” Pillary told reporters after briefing the UN Security Council on Monday.

The UN official claimed that the situation in Syria “a non-international internal armed conflict,” the legal term for a civil war, saying “there is a risk of escalation.”

The UK newspaper Guardian also said in a June 22 report that the Saudi regime pays the armed rebels inside Syria to encourage “mass defections from the military and… pressure” the Damascus government.

On Saturday, diplomats meeting at the United Nations office in Geneva, reached an agreement on a Syrian-led transitional governing body that could include members of the Syrian government, leaders of the opposition, and other groups.

The foreign ministers of Russia, China, Britain, France, Turkey, Qatar, Kuwait, and Iraq, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Arab League Secretary General Nabil El-Araby, and the secretary of state of the United States attended the meeting.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since mid-March 2011. The violence has claimed the lives of many people, including large numbers of security forces.

While the West and the Syrian opposition say the government is responsible for the killings, Damascus blames “outlaws, saboteurs and armed terrorist groups” for the unrest, insisting that it is being orchestrated from abroad.