Russia sells Syria weapons and has its only military base outside the former Soviet Union in the Syrian port of Tartus.

“The Russian government is not only unapologetically arming a government that is killing its own people, but also providing it with diplomatic cover,” Philippe Bolopion, UN director at Human Rights Watch in New York, said after the UN vote.

Russia’s alignment with Syria may put at stake the country’s relationship with oil-rich Gulf States led by Qatar that asked the Security Council to endorse their plan to convince Assad to delegate his powers to a deputy to pave way for elections.

“The Russians are doing this to help preserve their navy base in Tartus, their arms trade with Syria and their strategic position in the Eastern Mediterranean,” Sullivan said. “In the end Russia will lose its base. Russia has also in many ways lost the Arabs on this.”

Bahrain: Brutal, Unjust and Clock that is running out...tic tic tic toc

Bahrain must investigate more than a dozen deaths that followed the use of tear gas by security forces, rights group Amnesty International said on Thursday after the Gulf kingdom reported that a man had died while in custody.

Protests in Bahrain appear to have picked up recently despite the findings released in November of a government-backed  commission established to investigate abuses by the government and security forces, Mariwan Hama-Saeed of Human Rights Watch says.

"We were expecting (the government) just to ease up on these people, but since this report was published we've seen crackdowns every day," he says.

Reuters reported that Bahrain's Interior Ministry said that a man detained by police over "acts of sabotage" died in the hospital, without elaborating on the cause of death.

According to Amnesty, a Bahraini human rights group has reported at least 13 deaths resulting from the security forces' use of tear gas against peaceful protesters as well as inside people's homes with a rise in such deaths in recent months.

A 20-year-old was seriously injured and hospitalized after being hit in the head by a tear gas canister launched by riot police, the group said. Amnesty went on to document a series of incidents that allegedly showed how tear gas had been used improperly, including against women, children and the elderly.