Syrian regime forces pounded parts of Damascus during the night, sending residents fleeing from the northern Barzeh district, as fighting also raged in the northern city of Aleppo, a watchdog said Saturday.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said regime shelling continued on Saturday and also affected the Palestinian Yarmuk refugee camp along with the Jubar, Barzeh and Qaboon neighborhoods of Damascus.
The shelling was particularly fierce in Barzeh, the watchdog said, adding that snipers were deployed in the district as residents were reported fleeing the area.
The Observatory said fighting also raged in the northern city of Aleppo, with at least 12 rebels reported killed amid clashes with regime troops near the international airport.
The Syrian Revolution General Commission -- an activist network on the ground in Syria -- reported regime troop reinforcements being deployed in Daraya, a suburb south of the capital.
It reported "five tanks and three trucks accompanied by several cars and buses carrying soldiers from the Mazzeh military airport" heading towards the area, where government forces have for months been trying to establish control.
Meanwhile, in the eastern city of Deir Ezzor, the Observatory reported heavy fighting in the Huweika district and a car bomb blast near a building housing regime forces. There were no immediate details on casualties in the explosion.
The Observatory says rebel forces control approximately 30 percent of the strategic town, which is located near oil fields and close to the Iraqi border.
The Observatory, which collects information from a network of representatives and medics on the ground in Syria, put the death toll for Friday at 216 people, one of the highest figures in recent weeks.
On Saturday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which helps Palestinian refugees, said a member of its teaching staff had been killed in the Khan Eshieh camp, southwest of Damascus.
Nasri Khalil Hasan was killed by shrapnel that hit him as he fled his home under artillery fire, UNRWA said, adding that Hasan was the sixth member of its staff in Syria to be killed in the conflict.
On-ground Developments
In recent months, the regime has escalated airstrikes and artillery attacks on rebel-held areas in the north and east of the country, rights groups have said.
On Saturday, the New York-based Human Rights Watch said Syrian forces have dropped at least 156 cluster bombs in 119 locations across the country in the past six months, causing mounting civilian casualties.
Two strikes in the past two weeks killed 11 civilians, including two women and five children, the report said. The group said it based its findings on field investigations and analysis of more than 450 amateur videos.
Cluster bombs open in flight, scattering smaller bomb lets. They pose a threat to civilians long afterwards since many don't explode immediately. Most countries have banned their use.
A senior Syrian government official denied Saturday that regime forces use cluster bombs and said, "Many amateur videos are doubtful."
He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to make official statements to the media.
The fighting in Syria has killed more than 80,000 people and displaced 4 million of the country's 24 million people, according to the Syrian Human Rights Watchdog.
The conflict remains deadlocked, despite some recent military gains by the rebels.
On Saturday, rebels in Deir el-Zour detonated a car rigged with more than two tons of explosives next to the tallest building in the city, known as the Insurance Building, state TV said.
The TV said rebels entered the building after the blast but were pushed out by government forces.
Late Friday, rebel fighters from the al-Qaida-linked group Jabhat al-Nusra and other Islamist factions seized a military base and munitions depot in the town of Khan Touman in the northern province of Aleppo, the Observatory said.
On Friday, a European Union summit heard an appeal by Britain and France to lift the EU ban on arming the rebels.
16 Mar, 2013
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Source: http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/2013/03/16/Shelling-in-Damascus-drives-residents-to-flee.html
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