Pressure builds on Assad as EU bans crude oil imports

The European Union has adopted a ban on crude oil imports from Syria in a move aimed at increasing pressure on the regime of Bashar al-Assad. The oil embargo, to take effect from Saturday, will deprive the regime of a vital source of cash as the EU buys 95 per cent of Syria's crude oil, providing a third of the regime's hard currency earnings.

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The loss of the oil is not expected to have a huge impact across the European Union,
where Syrian crude accounts for a mere 1.5 percent of the bloc's imports. Syria has already warned it will find buyers elsewhere.

At a meeting of the 27-bloc on Friday in Poland, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton pledged there would be no let-up in efforts to press Assad to end the regime's relentless repression.

"We have been looking at what more we can do," Ashton said. "That is a conversation that keeps going on ... a conversation on what more can be done."

New sanctions could also include a ban on investments in the oil sector.

The EU on Friday also expanded a list of around 50 people, including Assad himself, targeted by an assets freeze and travel ban, adding four Syrian businessmen accused of bankrolling the regime.

And three firms, including a bank, were added to an existing blacklist of eight Syrian and Iranian firms. The identities of the new targets will be released on Saturday in the EU's Official Journal.

The EU ban on crude oil comes as Syrian forces are reported to have killed at least 17 people on Friday.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said eight people were killed as security forces intervened to disperse protests in several suburbs of Damascus, including Douma and Erbeen.

Six other people died in Homs province and three in the eastern city of Deir Ezzor including a 16-year-old girl.

According to the United Nations, more than 2,200 people have been killed since the beginning of near-daily protests across the country against Assad's regime in mid-March.