200 Ba'athists Quit Over Syria's Protest Crackdown

Party members from Deraa, the heart of the Syrian uprising, say they can't support president's brutal suppression.

Some 200 members of Syria's ruling Ba'ath party have quit over President Bashar al-Assad's bloody handling of six weeks of pro-democracy protests. The Ba'athists who resigned came from the city of Deraa, where the uprising started and where, this week, the Syrian army was sent in to ruthlessly quell any more demonstrations. As many as 450 people have died so far in the protests, and the instability has led to hundreds of Syrians streaming over to Lebanon to avoid the violence. Meanwhile, Russia rejected a UN Security Council draft proposal condemning Syria, saying the mounting strife is not a threat to international peace.