By REUTERS
AMMAN - Syrian troops on Sunday arrested prominent writer Ali Abdallah, a fierce critic of the state's use of violence against a four-month uprising against four decades of autocratic rule, his son said."Ten soldiers entered my father's house around 9:00 a.m. in the Damascus suburb of Qatana and took him. He just had heart surgery three weeks ago," Abdallah's son Mohammad told Reuters by phone from exile in Washington.Abdallah, a 61-year-old secular thinker, was released in May after spending four years in prison because of his membership of the Damascus Declaration, a pro-democracy group of intellectuals and opposition figures, and his criticism of President Bashar Assad's alliance with Iran's clerical rulers.
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