Syrian legislator joins anti-Assad uprising

A member of Syria's parliament has left the country and says he is joining the opposition movement against President Bashar al-Assad, as the crackdown on anti-government protests continues.

Imad Ghalioun, who represented the central city of Homs, told the Dubai-based al-Arabiya TV on Sunday night that the city is "disaster stricken" and has been subjected to sweeping human rights violations. Ghalioun said he was able to leave Syria before a travel ban was imposed on officials.

He said there are many legislators who support the uprising but have not said so publicly.

Homs has been one of the most volatile regions in Syria since the uprising against Assad began in March.

Activists say deaths continue

The United Nations has said that more than 5,000 people have been killed since March, not including an estimated 400 people the organisation thinks have been killed in the past three weeks, despite the presence of observers dispatched by the Arab League.

On Monday, activists said Syrian security forces fired on a town that observers were visiting. The monitors were in Ariha, in Idlib province, as part of their mission to monitor an end to the violence.

Despite their presence, activists reported the deaths of at least 21 people across the country on Monday.

The latest report of violence came as the political and military opposition to Assad announced that they had set up a liaison office to co-ordinate their action aimed at bringing down the government.

Strengthening the defectors

The Syrian National Council (SNC), the main opposition bloc, said in a statement on Monday the decision to create the office was taken in talks on Saturday with the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is comprised of deserters from the military.

In addition to the office, a hotline "to follow internal political developments on the ground" was created, the SNC said. It did not say where the office would be located.

The statement said further meetings would be held involving military experts "to strengthen the capacity of the FSA against regime forces and to protect civilian regions which the regime wants to raid or pillage".

Syrian fighters have regrouped in Lebanon to plan raids on Syrian government checkpoints [Al Jazeera]

The talks also focused on efforts to "restructure FSA units and create a modern and flexible structure ... to allow for rapid deployment" and cope with the daily inflow of deserting officers and soldiers.

The FSA claims to have gathered some 40,000 fighters under its command since March.

Assad offers amnesty

On Sunday, Assad issued a decree granting amnesty to anyone who committed crimes "in the context of the events taking place since March 15, 2011, till the date of issuing the decree", SANA state news agency reported.

Assad has freed 3,952 prisoners since the outbreak of the uprising, SANA said. The opposition, however, says there are thousands more held incommunicado in Syrian prisons.

Assad has made similar decrees on three previous occasions in May, June and November. Sunday's announcement was made on the official SANA news agency and broadcast on state television.

On the international front, Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, urged Assad to stop the violence.

"Today, I say again to President Assad of Syria: stop the violence. Stop killing your people. The path of repression is a dead end," Ban said in a keynote address at a conference in Beirut, the Lebanese capital, on democracy in the Arab world.

Source: Al Jazeera and agencies