BEIRUT — Gunmen shot and killed the brother of Syria's parliament speaker as he drove to work in the capital Damascus Tuesday, the state-run news agency reported, as the international envoy for Syria warned the country could become another Somalia. Mohammed Osama Laham, brother of Parliament Speaker Jihad Laham, was killed in the Damascus neighborhood of Midan, the SANA news agency said. UN-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, meanwhile, said what is happening in Syria is a “big catastrophe.” In remarks published Tuesday in the pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat, he said the international efforts now are focused on getting a “binding resolution by the (UN) Security Council” to start a political process that will lead to change. “I don't want to go too far in pessimism, but the situation in Syria is very dangerous. The Syrian people are suffering a lot,” Brahimi said. “I believe that if the crisis is not solved in a right way, there will be the danger of Somalization. It will mean the fall of the state, rise of war lords and militias.” In another blow to the Assad regime, Turkey's state-run news agency reported Tuesday that seven Syrian generals defected to Turkey. The Anadolu Agency said they arrived in the Turkish border province of Hatay seeking refuge. Their identities were not disclosed. The agency said they were taken to a refugee camp in Hatay that shelters defected soldiers. They join dozens of other generals who have abandoned the regime. More than 110,000 Syrians have sought refuge in Turkey since the uprising. — AP
