A screenshot of Maj. Gen Abdul Azia Jassem al-Shallal's video statement. (Al Arabiya)

According to The New York Times, Al Arabiya aired the video of military police chief Maj. Gen. Abdul Azia Jassem al-Shallal saying the Syrian military had fallen away from "its fundamental mission to protect the nation" and had undergone a "transformation into gangs of killing and destruction."

It's thought the general is now in Turkey, where many defectors have retreated after cutting ties with the Syrian government. 

Gen. Shallal suggested during the video other senior officers were waiting for the right time to defect on their own, foreshadowing a continued snowball effect against Assad's rule. Over the last two years, "dozens of lower-ranking Syrian military officers and hundreds of soldiers" have left the country, the Times reports.

Read the full story here, and more of Neon Tommy's Syria coverage here.

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