Turkey's state news agency says 85 Syrian soldiers, including general, defect to Turkey | iNFOnews | Thompson-Okanagan's News Source
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Turkey's state news agency says 85 Syrian soldiers, including general, defect to Turkey

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - This image made from amateur video released by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and accessed Saturday, June 30, 2012, purports to show Syrians standing at the site after an explosion in Zamalka near Damascus, Syria. In the latest episode, activists said dozens of people were killed and wounded in a powerful explosion Saturday evening that hit a funeral procession in a suburb of the Syrian capital Damascus. Details of the blast in Zamalka remain murky, but amateur videos showed gruesome images of bodies, some with their limbs torn, lying on the ground as people walked about dazed in a cloud of smoke. (AP Photo/Syrian Observatory for Human Rights via AP video) TV OUT, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CANNOT INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE CONTENT, DATE, LOCATION OR AUTHENTICITY OF THIS MATERIAL

ANKARA, Turkey - Turkey's state-run news agency says nearly 300 Syrians have defected to Turkey, including 85 soldiers.

The Anadolu Agency says this happened Monday and that the 293 Syrians included a general and several other officers.

The report says it was one of the largest groups of Syrian army defectors to cross into Turkey at one time since the unrest began in Syria. Turkey is now home to more than 35,000 Syrian refugees.

News from © The Associated Press, 2012
The Associated Press

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