Assad holds unannounced meeting with Secretary of Iran's supreme national security council

President Bashar al-Assad vowed on Tuesday to crush the uprising against his regime and cleanse the country of “terrorists,” the state news agency reported.

"The Syrian people and its government are determined to purge the country of terrorists and to combat terrorism relentlessly," he was quoted by state news agency SANA as telling his guest Jalili.

Assad affirmed that Syria is moving ahead with the national dialogue and is able by its people's will to foil the foreign projects that are aimed at targeting the resistance in the region and weakening Syria's role in it.

However, Jalili arrived Tuesday morning in Damascus from Beirut, on a one-day visit to review major bilateral, regional and international developments with senior Syrian officials.

Jalili said that "what is taking place in Syria is not an internal issue but rather a conflict between the resistance axis on one hand and the enemies of this axis in the region and the world on the other hand with the goal being to strike Syria's resistant role."

Jalili alluded to enemies plots against Syria, saying, “The enemies should not be allowed to take the revenge of their defeats by the resistance of which Syria is an essential part."

Earlier, Jalili was quoted as saying by the Damascus correspondent of the Iranian channel Al-Alam that "the solution to the crisis in Syria must come from the country through national dialogue, not through the intervention of foreign forces."

Iran is the main regional ally of Syria and has been accusing the United States, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey of supporting the Free Syrian Army to topple the Syrian regime.

On the ground, clashes continues in Aleppo. Clashes took place in the center of the city, including the neighborhoods of Antioch, Aziziyah, Bab Jenin Bahrat Sabah, and near the courthouse in the west part of the city. The army also pounded parts of Shaar and Sakhour. The opposition activists have said the army had used helicopters and bombed the area of Hanano.

Monday was a particularly bloody day in Syria in which 226 people were killed across the country, including 147 civilians, 57 members of the security forces and 22 rebels, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.

After kidnapping 48 Iranians in Syrian, Iran started to move towards Syria and Turkey seeking to reach a deal saving their lives, especially that the Free Syrian Army killed three of them yesterday. Based on this, Saeed Jalili started an unannounced visit to Syria, at the same time the Iranian Foreign Minister was visiting Turkey for the same purpose.

In fact, on the ground, it seems that the regime forces could not defeat the Free Syrian Army in either Damascus nor Aleppo. According to personal information, the regime forces hide in safe places to protect themselves from bombings and the air force is bombing Free Syrian Army compounds.

Source: http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/08/07/230946.html