Death toll in Syria exceeds 5,000, election results within hours

The death toll from Syria's crackdown on a 9-month-old uprising has exceeded 5,000 people, the top U.N. rights official said Monday, as Syrians closed their businesses and kept children home from school as part of a general strike to pressure President Bashar Assad to end the bloodshed.      

Navi Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, said at least 300 children are among those killed in the Assad regime's attempts to stamp out the revolt, and that thousands of people remain in detention.        

Meanwhile, an activist group reported on Tuesday that Syrian security forces have killed 11 civilians in a northwestern region where the army clashes frequently with anti-regime military defectors.     

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Tuesday another 26 people were injured in the shootings in two villages on Monday in the restive province of Idlib, which borders Turkey.     

In a separate incident in Idlib, Syria's state-run media reported that border guards prevented 15 gunmen from infiltrating from Turkey on Monday. The report said that two infiltrators were killed.    

Amid the violence, the government pushed ahead with municipal elections that the opposition has dismissed as a meaningless concession that falls far short of their demands for Assad to give up power.      

Witnesses said turnout was low. The opposition does not consider the vote a legitimate concession by the regime because it coincides with the deadly crackdown on anti-government protesters.

The regime had touted the vote as a reform measure because some new rules were introduced recently allowing more people to run in the election.

Judge Nazir Kheirallah, head of the Elections' Subcommittee in Damascus Governorate, said that the final election results will come out within hours.

AP