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Sunday
May152011

Syria, Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Advancing?

1945 GMT: Claimed demonstration in Homs in Syria tonight:

1505 GMT: Tunisian authorities says their military repelled an incursion by 200 troops of the Libyan regime.

The Tunisian military sent tanks, armoured vehicles and troops to the Tataouine region on its southern border with Libya.

1500 GMT: Video of a funeral today in Syria for a slain protester:

1445 GMT: Moroccan security services have used truncheons, injuring four people, to disperse a pro-democracy protest on the southern outskirts of the capital Rabat.

Dozens of demonstrators tried to hold a protest picnic in front of what they say is a secret government detention centre.

Anti-riot police chased the protesters before the rally could begin, beating some with long rubber truncheons. There was no word on arrests.

1435 GMT: The Egyptian Ministry of Health has said 78 people have been injured in clashes between Coptic Christians and unidentified assailants at a sit-in near the State TV building in Cairo.

The fighting began at around 9 p.m. Saturday night, when dozens of men from poor neighbourhoods near the site attacked a Christian sit-in with stones, Molotov cocktails, and live ammunition.

The protesters were armed with clubs and metal chains as well as petrol bomb, according to witnesses. Two people were reportedly hit by gunfire from a car near the protest.

Today the head of the Coptic Church call for an end to the sit-in.

0840 GMT: AFP is reporting that one person has been killed and five injured in firing from Syria into Lebanon.

Al Jazeera English reports from resident that the tension is in the Wadi Khalid region. There are three injuries from gunshot wounds, one a Lebanese army soldier manning a checkpoint on the border.

0550 GMT: Claimed video of a demonstration last night in Hama in Syria:

0535 GMT: There are tentative reports this morning of an advance by opposition forces in western Libya. Having secured the country's third-largest city, Misurata, after a regime siege of more than two months, the opposition appears to have begun pushing west. It's a small step --- Zliten lies several kilometres away --- but a symbolic one.

Talk of advance of a different kind in Syria, as the Assad regime spoke on Saturday of a "national dialogue" with opposition figures on reforms. Even as the statements came out, however, the Syrian military was shelling the southern town of Tal Kalekh, killing fours and sending hundreds across the border into Lebanon. 

And this discreetly-taken video seems to contradict the regime's claim that it has taken forces out of the coastal town of Baniyas:

Definitely no advance in Yemen: at least 35 more protesters were wounded on Saturday when plainclothes gunmen fired into their camp. And even as Gulf Cooperation Council Secretary-General Abdullatif Al-Zayani was returning to Yemen to look for an agreement, Kuwait pulled out of the now-dormant GCC initiative for President Saleh to transfer power.

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