Deadly mortar attack hits Assad gathering in Syria

BEIRUT: A mortar shell struck a large tent where supporters of President Bashar Assad had gathered for election campaigning in southern Syria, killing at least 21 people and wounding many others, opposition activists said Friday.

State media reported the mortar strike late Thursday, saying it killed and wounded an unspecified number of civilians inside the tent.

Assad, rarely seen in public since the start of Syria´s 3-year-old conflict, has not been seen campaigning since he declared his candidacy last month and was not at the gathering in the southern city of Daraa, where the uprising against his rule began in March 2011. More than 160,000 people have been killed in the fighting as the revolt morphed into a civil war that has also sent millions fleeing for their lives and turned once-prosperous cities into rubble-strewn warzones.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. Rebels trying to overthrow Assad frequently fire mortar shells into Syria´s major cities, including the capital, Damascus, from opposition-held suburbs.

The overnight attack underscored concerns that rebels will step up attacks against government strongholds in the run-up to the June 3 election to disrupt the voting. Western leaders and opposition groups have described the vote held amid the civil war as a sham.

Ahmad Masalma, an opposition activist in Daraa, said rebels from the Free Syrian Army umbrella group fired a mortar shell at the tent in a government-held area after repeatedly warning civilians to stay away.

He said there were about 100 people in the tent, including members of pro-Assad militias, officers and employees. More than 25 people were killed and the rest wounded in the attack which "set the tent ablaze and sent shrapnel flying everywhere," he said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on activists on the ground for its reports, also said the shelling targeted an "electoral tent" and killed 21 people, including 11 civilians.

In Syria, rallies and other public gatherings by Assad´s supporters are being held, often in tents, in some government-controlled parts of the country ahead of the election. Assad is widely expected to win a third, seven-year mandate.