Syrian Uprising | featured news

A defiant Syrian President Bashar Assad offered no new initiatives Sunday to revive a faltering United Nations peace plan but instead assailed a "foreign conspiracy" stoking violence and denied his government had a role in "monstrous massacres" across the nation.

International envoy Kofi Annan said on Friday he was "frustrated and impatient" a week after a massacre in Syria of 108 people shocked the world, but Russia said his peace plan was still the best hope for Syria.

A U.S. government website on Friday published what it said was photographic evidence of mass graves and attacks on civilian areas by Syrian government forces.

Syrian forces and pro-government militia accused of committing a massacre in Houla could face prosecution for crimes against humanity, the United Nations said on Friday and rights experts said Syrian authorities had directly ordered torture.

Governments around the world expelled Syrian ambassadors and diplomats Tuesday, an unusual, coordinated blow to Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime following a gruesome massacre that the United Nations said involved close-range shootings of scores of children and parents in their homes.

Horrific images of dozens of mutilated children's corpses in the village of Houla prompted a rare moment of unity on Sunday from the United Nations Security Council.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said on Wednesday that countries trying to "sow chaos" in Syria could be infected with it themselves, an apparent warning to Arab Gulf nations that back the insurgency aimed at forcing him from power.

Dozens of people were killed or wounded in two "terrorist explosions" which struck a southern district of the Syrian capital Damascus on Thursday, state television said.

Syria is finding it increasingly hard to buy grain on international markets because sanctions have blocked its access to trade finance, while growing numbers of its citizens are struggling to obtain food after more than a year of conflict.

Syrians voted in a parliamentary election on Monday touted by authorities as a milestone of political reform but dismissed by the opposition as a facade while people are killed every day in an anti-government uprising.