DAMASCUS – Two nephews of Syrian Vice President Farooq Al-Shaara have been arrested along with five of their friends over their support for democratic change, a monitoring group said Thursday.

“University professor Zaydun Zohbi, 38, and his brother Suhaib, who are nephews of Farooq Al-Shaara, and five of their friends, activists in favor of peaceful change in Syria, were arrested at a cafe on Dec. 15 by members of the military intelligence,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Observatory, which depends on a large network of activists and doctors across Syria for its information, demanded their “immediate” release and that of “all civilian and military prisoners.”

The arrests come after the vice president said in comments published Monday that he favors a negotiated solution to Syria’s bloody uprising, a position at odds with President Bashar Al-Assad.

Shaara, the most prominent Sunni Muslim official in the Alawite minority dominated regime of Assad, also told the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar that a clear winner was unlikely to emerge from the conflict.

The Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria, which is close to the opposition, says there are nearly 35,000 people held in jails across the war-torn country by the Assad regime. – AFP