Harmoush: I didn\'t receive any orders to fire at civilians

Hussein Harmoush said that he escaped from the Army because of the bloody events in the streets… a number of people were killed, and I am sure that the armed groups were the killers." In a speech to the Syrian TV broadcast Thursday, Harmoush said that in 2009 he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, then he joined a security course for one year at the National Institute for Security Sciences but he didn't succeed, adding "on June 6, 2011, I announced my defection from the Syrian Arab Army." "During my service in the Syrian Army, nobody has ordered me to fire at the civilians or any others, I didn't see or hear any commander in the army that had given orders to shoot fire at the civilians," Harmoush added. He went on to say "after my escape from the army, a lot of opposition figures abroad contacted me, but after 75 days, I discovered that the majority of them have given promises, including financial and logistic aid, weapons and others, but non has been met." On their need for weapons, Harmoush said "The plot was to provide weapons for protecting the unarmed civilians, but weapons or any other materials were not supplied." Harmoush underlined that he didn't fire at any security or military members, and that he said in a previous statement that even if a soldier killed him, he wouldn't kill the soldier. "Muslim brotherhood members were the first who have contacted me, all in unreal names, in addition to Zouheir al-Siddiq, Mohammad Rahal, Abdul-Halim Khaddam, his two sons and the majority of Antalya Conference figures," Harmoush said. He underlined that Muslim Brotherhood members asked him what he will do and he answered them "what do you have", adding "there were some sides that suggested setting up a buffer zone through the Turkish Government near the border lines between Syria and Turkey." On providing him with weapons and money, Harmoush said "They were all promises… they promised to supply me with weapons and money for liberation, but they were just promises." Harmoush said, "When I arrived in Turkey, they started to call me including Abdul-Halim Khaddam. All phone calls were just words and wasting of time." He added that Rifaat al-Assad's office manager called him after he had issued statement No.1 to ask him about the amount of money his movement needs. Harmoush went on saying that Burhan Ghalion called him twice to ask him about his safety and Khaddam and his sons, Rifaat al-Assad, Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammad Rahal and about 300 personalities from Antalya conference called him, too. He said that Sheikh Adnan al-Arour called him to know about the work plan and asked him about the army in general. Harmoush said that Zouheir al-Siddiq was the first person to call him once he arrived in Turkey, adding that al-Siddiq called him to tell him that he can support him and sent USD 1,000 and a used laptop. Al-Siddiq and the Muslim Brotherhood smuggled weapons into Homs, Hama, Idleb and the Palestinian Ramel in Lattakia, Harmoush added. He said that weapon smuggling from Turkey was carried out by merchants in the border areas where weapon merchants and smugglers exist. He also said that the first time he was video-taped was in Bdama district in Jisr al-Shughour when a person gave him SYP 50,000 and the person received about SYP 2 millions for the video tape. "I have been thinking about coming back since Ramadan 15, but I was shocked to be used as a trade and how people begged money in my name and offered many promises none of which was achieved." Harmoush concluded.