Dozens of civilians were killed in the city of Homs, opposition activists and Syrian state media said today, although they disputed responsibility for what both sides called a massacre.
The carnage in Homs, as well as a military assault on the northwestern city of Idlib, coincided with a weekend peace mission by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who left Damascus yesterday without agreement on a truce or humanitarian access.
"The terrorist armed groups have kidnapped scores of civilians in the city of Homs, central Syria, killed, and mutilated their corpses and filmed them to be shown by media outlets," state news agency Sana said on its website.
Footage posted by opposition activists on YouTube showed men, women and children lying dead in a blood-drenched room.
The Local Co-ordination Committees of Syria, a grassroots opposition network, said at least 45 women and children had been stabbed and burned in the Homs district of Karm al-Zeitoun. It said another seven people were killed in the city's Jobar district, which adjoins the former rebel bastion of Baba Amr.
Activists contacted in Homs accused Alawite "shabbiha" militia loyal to president Bashar al-Assad of carrying out the killings under the protection of regular Syrian military forces.
Waleed Fares, an activist in Homs's Khalidiyah district, which is about one km from Karm al-Zeitoun, said that 30 to 40 tanks had arrived in Karm al-Zeitoun last night.
"We know now that four families have been killed by shabbiha. We have 21 names and we are trying to confirm the names of the rest," he said via Skype, adding that the victims were all from Syria's Sunni Muslim majority.
He said most of the killings occurred in Karm al-Zeitoun, but some took place in other districts. "The Free Syrian army helped move the bodies to one place. Otherwise the regime forces would have hidden the evidence," he said.
Syrian government restrictions on the media have made it difficult to assess conflicting reports by the authorities and their opponents since an uprising against Dr Assad began a year ago.
Sana said the Homs killings "perpetrated by the armed terrorist groups and aired by (satellite TV channels) Al Jazeera and Arabiya ... coincide with today's UN Security Council session to call for foreign interference in Syria".
In the southern city of Deraa, scene of sporadic street fighting between Free Syrian Army rebels and Assad's troops, a car bomb killed a schoolgirl and wounded 25 others at a girls' school. An opposition activist said members of the school had taken part in anti-Assad demonstrations.
Meanwhile, US secretary of state Hillary Clinton said Dr Assad must end his violence against anti-government demonstrators around the country before they can be asked to stop defending themselves.
"First and foremost the Assad government has to end the violence," Mrs Clinton said after a special UN Security Council session.
"Once the Syrian government has acted, then we would expect others as well to end the violence," she said in New York, where she is meeting Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov. "But there cannot be an expectation for defenceless citizens in the face of artillery assaults to end their capacity to defend themselves before there's a commitment by the Assad regime to do so."
Russia, long an ally of Syria, and China have blocked attempts to pass a Security Council resolution condemning Damascus for its attempts to crush a year-old rebellion by force, in which thousands have died. Moscow and Beijing want any international blame for the violence to be apportioned more evenly.
China's assistant foreign minister, Zhang Ming, said in Riyadh yesterday both Syrian sides should stop fighting and aid should be sent to strife-torn areas - but he also warned other states not to use aid to "interfere".
The United Nations says Dr Assad's forces have killed more than 7,500 people in their crackdown on protesters and insurgents. Authorities say rebels have killed 2,000 soldiers.
Mr Annan's mission coincided with a Syrian military offensive against opposition strongholds in the northwest.
His spokesman said today the former UN chief feels his Syria mediation mission is on track. "This is the beginning of a process and the joint special envoy feels the process is on the right track," Ahmad Fawzi said. "He has left a set of concrete proposals with Bashar on a cessation of hostilities, humanitarian access and political dialogue, and expects to hear from him shortly.
"He is concerned that the fighting and the killing seem to be continuing while he is trying to put an end to it and while he is trying to talk to Bashar," Mr Fawzi said. "It will be a step by step process. We have to get the opposition on board. We have to get the opposition parties to unify under one umbrella. And then we have to convince the government to come and meet them in whichever venue he [Annan] proposes."
The exiled opposition Syrian National Council ruled out talks while Dr Assad is in power."Negotiations can never take place between the victim and torturer: Assad and his entourage must step down as a condition before starting any serious negotiations," it said.
Reuters