Key Syrian tribal chief hits out at regime crackdown

(AFP)- "There is still a last-ditch opportunity to avoid the bloodshed that the regime persists in causing," Al-Bakkara chief Nawaf al-Bashir said by telephone from the city of Deir el-Zor in eastern Syria. "The regime needs to launch a national dialogue with the people, particularly the revolutionary youth, with a defined agenda and time frame," added Bashir, who says he has been banned from travelling abroad for the past 16 years because of his opposition to the government. "We believe in peaceful political change," he said, adding that a national dialogue should lead to "legislation allowing the free formation of political parties and media outlets, and the scrapping of Article II of the constitution" which enshrines the monopoly of power by the ruling Baath party..."