Spain Joins Call for U.N. Sanctions against Syria

Spain said Friday it is joining calls for U.N. Security Council sanctions against Syria's government, blamed for at least 2,000 deaths since protests started in mid-March.

Spain is backing Britain, France, Germany and Portugal, which are preparing a sanctions resolution against President Bashar Assad's government, Foreign Minister Trinidad Jimenez said.

"Spain joins these calls," she told Spanish radio Cadena Ser.

"We hope the presentation of a new resolution to the Security Council can lead to a stronger, more forceful and especially broader international consensus of condemnation," the foreign minister said.

The resolution should make three demands: "End the violence, open a reform process and thirdly open a new era that leads the Syrian people to a period of freedom, which is what all people aspire to," she said.

In New York, Assad's envoy to the U.N. accused the West of waging a "humanitarian and diplomatic war" against the government in Damascus.

The Security Council however was told in a briefing on Syria of a shoot-to-kill policy against protesters, stadium executions and children feared killed in Syrian government custody.

The United States has said it strongly backs the resolution move.

U.S. President Barack Obama and European Union leaders earlier called for Assad to stand down in a move to step up international pressure on the Syrian president over his deadly crackdown on protests.

The measures proposed could include an assets freeze and travel ban against Syrian individuals as well as an arms embargo, according to Britain's deputy U.N. ambassador Philip Parham

It was not known when the resolution would be submitted.