Turkey: International community continues to apply pressure

Turkish Foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu with President Bashar Al Assad  Turkey is the latest country to weigh in as violence continues to escalate and the international community stacks pressure.  Turkish Foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu traveled to Syria to demand a stop to the crackdown on protests by president Bashar al-Assad's government.  Tayyip Erdogan Turkey's PM said earlier that he was running out of patience over "the savagery" of Syria's security forces towards protesters.  
Ahmet Davutoglu visit to the region, comes only a day after Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain removed their ambassadors from their Syrian post in Damascus.  From Turkey's point of view the Syrian crisis is almost an internal problem. Turkey shares a border with Syria that stretches over 800km (500 miles) long and trade has become very entwined, especially on the border regions,
Turkey's constituents - many of them Sunni Muslims - sympathies with protesters in the neighboring country, and there is growing anger in Turkey to what is happening to their neighbours. Mr. Davutoglu may threaten Turkish support for stronger action by the UN Security Council, although few believe he will have much success. President Assad's spokeswoman has already warned of an equally tough reply from Damascus.
As military assaults continue across Syria, Syrian state TV reports President Assad has appointed a new minister of defense- former army chief of staff Gen Dawoud Raijah, replacing Gen Ali.  The position of defense minister is a mostly ceremonial post in Syria. The professional core of the military consists of officers from the minority Alawite sect, the Shia offshoot that Assad belongs to, while most of the conscripts are Sunni.
The last 48 hours have been especially brutal, tanks pounded the eastern city of Deir al-Zour on Monday in a pre-dawn attack and reports by state news agency Sana today said troops are withdrawing from the city of Hama however witnesses say scores of people have been killed.
Assad's government disputes the toll and blames a foreign conspiracy for the unrest. But those claims have been dismissed by most of the international community, with world leaders ramping-up its condemnation of the security forces' actions in recent days.
India's UN ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri told reporters the countries would be "calling for restraint, renouncing violence, promoting reform, while taking into account the democratic aspirations of the people.''
Access to Syria has been severely restricted to international journalists, making it near impossible to verify accounts by witnesses and human rights activists who claim at least 1,700 civilians have lost their lives. Thousands have been placed under arrest and its believed more then 300 people have died in the past week alone, marking it the worst fighting since the uprising began in mid-march of this year.
Even with the secretly recorded videos that are leaked from Syria every day along with accounts by witnesses whispered down telephone lines, the regime has managed to keep a tight lid on the troubles that clearly do not end at the countries borders.