France is expelling Syrian Ambassador in protest against last week's massacre of 108 people, mostly women and children, in the Syrian village of Houla.
This was announced by President Francois Hollande at a news conference on Tuesday after meeting with his Benin counterpart Thomas Boni Yayi in Paris.
The new French leader said he took the decision in consultation with France's partners. "The murderous folly" of the Damascus regime threatened regional security, he told reporters.
Earlier, Australia announced the expulsion of Syrian Charge d'affaires Jawdat Ali and another diplomat from the Syrian Embassy in Canberra over the Houla massacre. Foreign Minister Bob Carr told reporters that he expected international sanctions would be announced soon.
Meanwhile, U.N.-Arab League Special Envoy Kofi Annan met with embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Tuesday in the wake of the Houla killings which the Assad government blamed on Islamist militants while United Nations observers implicated the Army.
Annan, who arrived in the Syrian capital on Monday, is attempting to salvage his six-point peace plan which has the backing of the United Nations and the Arab League. The peace plan seeks to find a solution to the 15-month-old uprising against the Assad regime which has claimed more than 10,000 lives in the Middle East country.
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