SANA reported on Tuesday, that Syrian passengers of two buses passing through
Kossair-Jousiyeh Road alongside the Lebanese-Syrian border were abducted by an
armed terrorist group.
This as Syria continues to
take lashings from the Security Council. A U.N. report released on Monday
includes Syrian government forces and their allied "shabiha" militias
for the first time on a list of 52 governments and armed groups that recruit,
kill or sexually attack
children in armed
conflicts. .
On the ground activists reported on Tuesday that a mortar
round has hit an anti-government demonstration in an eastern Syrian city,
killing at least 10 people.
The Local Coordination Committees and the Britain-based
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Tuesday's attack in Deir el-Zour hit
the protesters as they were dispersing.
The mortar attack came hours after a late Monday car bomb
killed a dozen people in Deir el-Zour, which is close to the border with
Iraq.
Violence in Syria has spiked in recent weeks, as President
Bashar Assad's regime and the opposition ignore an internationally brokered
cease-fire that was supposed to go into effect April 12 but never took
hold.
Activists say more than 13,000 people have been killed since
Syria's crisis, the worst in decades, began in March 2011.
For its part the Syrian Observatory for Human rights said
that a town in Homs was heavily bombarded by forces loyal to the Syrian regime.
Meanwhile a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon reported
an escalation in armed conflict between government and opposition forces.
The spokesperson also said that
UN observers were observing "planned and coordinated attacks on government
forces and civilian infrastructure in multiple locations."
International envoy Kofi Annan said in statement that he was
"gravely concerned" about the situation in Syria, following reports
from UN observers that Syrian helicopters were firing on rebellious areas
trapping civilians in several besieged
cities.
Annan’s spokesman Ahmad Fawzi later
said said former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is also working to convene a
diplomatic meeting soon to discuss the situation in Syria amid worsening
fighting between government troops and opposition forces.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta said that
there is no miraculous solution for the complicated tragedy that is Syria..
For his part, British Foreign
Secretary William Hague said on Tuesday that international efforts to stabilize
Syria were focused on trying to reach a peaceful transition, and that foreign
military intervention was not being considered.
"We are not looking for any foreign military intervention.
I think we should not think about it in terms of another Libya," he told a
news conference in the Pakistani capital Islamabad.
This as the Syrian National
Council called on the Syrian people and “Friends of Syria” to demonstrate on Wednesday
in front of Russian embassies against Moscow’s pro regime stances.
AP/REUTERS/LBCI