Syrian rebels appoint Mohd al-Bashir as interim PM

Will be the head of transitional govt till March 1; 40 tortured bodies found in Damascus morgue

THE rebels in Syria appointed a transitional head of government on Tuesday to run the country until March 1, a statement said.

"The general command has tasked us with running the transitional government until March 1," said a statement attributed to Mohammad al-Bashir on state television's Telegram account, referring to him as "the new Syrian prime minister".

Meanwhile, the rebel fighters said they found around 40 bodies bearing signs of torture inside a hospital morgue near Damascus on Monday, stuffed into body bags with numbers and sometimes names written on them.

"I opened the door of the morgue with my own hands; it was a horrific sight: about 40 bodies were piled up showing signs of gruesome torture," Mohammed al-Hajj, a fighter with rebel factions from the country's south, said by telephone from Damascus.

Dozens of photographs and video footage that Hajj said he took himself showed corpses with evident signs of torture: eyes and teeth gouged out, blood splattered, and bruising.

The footage taken in Harasta hospital also showed a piece of cloth containing bones, while a decomposing body's rib cage peaked through the skin.

The bodies were placed in white plastic bags or wrapped in white cloth, some stained with blood.

Corpses had pieces of cloth or adhesive tape bearing scribbled numbers and sometimes names. Some seemed to have been killed recently.