Thirty-four people were killed in the government crackdown on protesters across Syria on Saturday, as the Arab League announced was considering an appeal to the United Nations Security Council to bring an end to the violence. Activists based in Beirut told dpa that most of the dead were from the restive provinces of Homs and Idlib and seven were army defectors.
The deaths are the latest in an uprising that began in mid-March and has already claimed an 5,000 lives, according to the United Nations. The Syrian state news agency SANA meanwhile reported that security forces had clashed Saturday with "armed terrorists" in Homs and killed an unspecified number of them, including the group's leader.