DAMASCUS, 8 August 2005 — US and Iraqi forces have prevented over 700 Syrian trucks from returning to Syria, leaving them stranded near a border crossing in the desert, a human rights organization said yesterday. “These measures are imposed on Syrian trucks only, while Iraqi and Turkish trucks are passing easily,” said the Arab Organization of Human Rights in Syria in a statement.

It said the Syrian trucks had been stranded near the Yarubia border post for three days in difficult circumstances due to lack of water and extreme temperatures and charged that their flow was subject to “the mood of these forces”.

The group’s spokesman Ammar Qurabi said the flow of trucks from Syria to Iraq had not been hampered. Ties between Syria and Iraq have been strained because of repeated accusations by Iraqi and US officials that Damascus was not doing enough to prevent the flow of Islamist militants crossing into Iraq to fight US-led forces.

Syria, which denies the charges and says it wants solid ties with Baghdad, shares a long desert border with Iraq straddling about 600 km. “These extraordinary measures by American forces at the Syrian-Iraqi border represented a violation of the rights of Syrian citizens in Iraqi territory,” it said. AHORS said some trucks were allowed to pass after their drivers paid off Iraqi guards.

It quoted some drivers it had contacted as saying they suspected they were being used as human shields for a nearby US military base. “Some drivers spoke of the possibility that they are being used as (human) shields in view of their extreme vicinity to an American military base, about 40 meters,” it said.

The flow of trucks from Lebanon to Syria has been hampered in recent weeks. Damascus said it had introduced security measures after explosives were found on a truck bound for its territory. Lebanese politicians have said that tight Syrian border controls were the result of tensions between Beirut and Damascus after Syria pulled out its troops from Lebanon in April. Syria allowed trucks stranded for weeks to pass after a visit by new Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora to Damascus last month.

But tailbacks of trucks carrying everything from fresh fruit to cars are growing once more, while taxi drivers who ply the Beirut-Damascus route say restrictions have been tightened on them in recent days as well. Taxi drivers say business has been bad since February’s assassination of Lebanese former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri — blamed by many Lebanese on Syria, which denies any role — and Syria’s subsequent withdrawal after a 29-year military presence. Tourists have also stayed away amid a string of bombings in Lebanon.

At the Syrian customs post in Jdeideh, hawkers wind between the cars, selling cold drinks to passengers waiting in the sweltering summer heat. Miriam Manook, a British medical student traveling with friends to a wedding party in Damascus, waited more than two hours at the border, only to be told by customs officials that the wedding gifts would not be allowed in.

“It makes no sense because it is not clear what is forbidden and what isn’t,” said Manook, in Beirut for the summer. “You feel you are subject to the whims of customs officials.” One traveler said that the Lebanese sweets she had brought were banned, opened the box and began to eat them.