Syria's New Constitution Enters into Force

Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has signed Tuesday a decree with which the new Syrian constitution comes into force, after being approved by popular referendum Sunday.

According to data by the Syrian Ministry of Interior quoted by ITAR-TASS, the referendum had a 57.4% turnout, 89.4% of which voted in favor of the constitution proposals.

The chief innovations include the creation of a pluralistic party system replacing the one-party rule by the Baath Party, as well as a limitation on the number of the terms the president can serve to 2.

Opposition leaders have dismissed the referendum as a scam on the part of Assad, calling for a boycott and a stepping down of the president.

Sunday the referendum took place against the background of what agencies report as heavy bloodshed in unrestful Syrian city of Homs.

Friday, representatives of Western nations, including Bulgaria, gathered in a "Friends of Syria" conference in the Tunisian capital Tunis, recognized the rebel Syrian National Council as a legimate representative of Syrians.

Monday, the EU also recognized the Syrian National Council and imposed further severe sanctions on the regime in Damascus.

Monday Bulgarian Foreign Affairs Minister Nikolay Mladenov, who has taken a pro-active stance in events relating to the Arab Spring, said Bulgaria will host a further conference on Syria in April.

Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Akbar Salehi has urged Tuesday the international community to support the reformist push of the Damascus regime.

"Syria has a strategic role in the region and therefore we must help Assad's government to implement the reforms," Salehi told Kofi Annan, who has been elected UN and Arab League special envoy for Syria.

Salehi also stressed that any external intervention would further aggravate the situation in Syria, and called on the international community to support internal dialogue in the country.

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