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By Kari Huus, Staff writer, NBC News
Syrian rebels are holding hostage a convoy of United Nations peacekeepers in the Golan Heights, and have vowed to detain them until President Bashar Assad withdraws his forces from a Syrian village that has suffered heavy fighting.
The U.N. on Wednesday confirmed that about 20 of its peacekeepers were being held by about 30 armed fighters in the Golan Heights, where the forces are charged with monitoring a cease-fire line between Syria and Israel. The capture, first announced in a rebel video posted on the Internet, was condemned by the U.N. Security Council, which demanded their immediate release.
The U.N. observers were on a regular supply mission Wednesday when they were stopped near an observation post which sustained damage and was evacuated last weekend following heavy combat, according to U.N. deputy spokesman Eduardo del Buey. He said the U.N. peacekeeping mission has dispatched a team to assess the situation and attempt a resolution.
The seizure was the first overt threat to U.N. personnel since the start of the nearly two-year-old uprising against Assad. It came?as the Arab League okayed its member states to arm the rebels and as Britain said it would increase aid to the opposition forces.
The U.N. peacekeeping mission has been in place for nearly four decades, monitoring a ceasefire line between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, captured by Israel in a 1967 war.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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