Roadside bomb hits Syrian military truck, wounds 6 soldiers

An explosion has wounded at least six Syrian soldiers escorting the United Nations monitors in the town of Daraa. The incident occurred on Wednesday after a roadside bomb hit a Syrian military truck just seconds after a convoy carrying the head of the UN observer mission passed by. The blast injured a 1st lieutenant and five troops. The head of the UN observer mission, Maj. Gen.

"The incident occurred on Wednesday after a roadside bomb hit a Syrian military truck just seconds after a convoy carrying the head of the UN observer mission passed by"Robert Mood, was heading into the southern Syrian city with a team of observers and a convoy of journalists. The explosion was more than 100 meters (330 feet) behind the convoy. The bomb attack took place a day after UN-Arab League envoy; Kofi Annan briefed the UN Security Council (UNSC) by videoconference from Geneva on his efforts to end the year-plus-long unrest in Syria. After Annan’s briefing, Syria's UN Ambassador Bashar Jaafari accused foreign countries, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, of plotting to sabotage Annan's plan by fueling the violence. “We need to see everybody on board.

We need to see these Qataris, the Saudis, the Turkish government, as well as some other nations, stopping their incitement to violence, stopping their sponsorship of…the armed rebellion in Syria, stopping their financial contribution to cover up the needs of these armed groups and the needs of the terrorist groups, which are attacking…civilians as well as military targets in Syria,” said Jaafari. The Syrian official also stated that his country was committed to the plan. A few hours after Annan’s videoconference, US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice reiterated Washington’s call for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down. Rice claimed that Damascus has not fully implemented Annan's six-point peace plan, noting that “Washington is focusing on a regime change in Damascus.” The developments come as the UN observers continue monitoring a ceasefire, which has officially been in effect as part of the peace plan for more than three weeks. The first group of the observers arrived in the Syrian capital on late April 15 in line with the UNSC Resolution 2042, which had been approved a day earlier.

On April 21, the council met and unanimously approved Resolution 2043, which ratified a proposal to send a mission of 300 observers to Syria