BEIRUT (Reuters) – Armed Syrian rebels captured dozens of members of the security forces by seizing two military checkpoints on Monday, the opposition said, even as the Arab League chief reported cautious progress in a peace monitoring mission.

The opposition said army deserters also clashed with security forces at a third checkpoint, killing and wounding an unspecified number of troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – An advance team has arrived in Syria to prepare the way for Arab League monitors who will judge whether Damascus is honouring a plan it agreed last month to end violence that threatens to escalate into civil war.

The peace plan calls for a withdrawal of troops from the streets, release of prisoners and dialogue with the opposition. Thousands have died in a crackdown on protests against President Bashar al-Assad and, increasingly, in fighting between mutinous troops and security forces.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Arab League officials arrive in Syria on Thursday to prepare for monitors overseeing an Arab peace plan, after activists said President Bashar al-Assad’s forces carried out the deadliest assault in their nine-month crackdown on protests.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Syrian forces killed 111 civilians and activists were killed on Tuesday when Assad’s forces surrounded them in the hills of Idlib province and unleashed two hours of bombardment and heavy gunfire.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Syrian forces killed 111 people ahead of the start of a mission to monitor President Bashar al-Assad’s implementation of an Arab League peace plan, activists said on Wednesday, and France branded the killings an “unprecedented massacre”.

Rami Abdulrahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 111 civilians and activists were killed in addition to over 100 casualties among army deserters in Idlib province, turning Tuesday into the “bloodiest day of the Syrian revolution”.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Fierce fighting has continued in the northern Syrian province of Idlib, with activists saying 50 people were killed there and elsewhere on Tuesday, shortly before officials arrive to prepare for an Arab League effort to end nine months of bloodshed.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 23 people were killed in fighting with President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in the northern province of Idlib and 14 members of his security forces died in a rebel ambush in the south. The overall death toll on Tuesday was at least 47, it said.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Nearly 50 people were killed in Syria on Tuesday, an activist group said, two days before Arab League officials were due to arrive to prepare for a monitoring mission assessing Syrian compliance with a plan to stem the bloodshed.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 23 people were killed in fighting with President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in the northern province of Idlib and 14 members of his security forces died in a rebel ambush in the south. The overall death toll on Tuesday was at least 47, it said.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Nearly 50 people were killed in Syria on Tuesday, an activist group said, two days before Arab League officials were due to arrive to prepare for a monitoring mission assessing Syrian compliance with a plan to stem the bloodshed.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 23 people were killed in fighting with President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in the northern province of Idlib and 14 members of his security forces died in a rebel ambush in the south. The overall death toll on Tuesday was at least 47, it said.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Arab states may ask the U.N. Security Council to endorse their peace plan aimed at ending a Syrian crackdown on protests against President Bashar al-Assad, Qatar’s foreign minister said after talks with Arab League ministers on Saturday.

Expressing frustration that Syria had not implemented the plan, six weeks after it was first agreed, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani said the window for an Arab solution to the crisis was closing.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Hundreds of thousands of Syrians took to the streets on Friday to protest against President Bashar al-Assad, activists said, a day after Syria’s big power ally Russia sharpened its criticism of Damascus in a draft United Nations resolution.

Activists and residents said Syrian forces shot dead four people in a continuing crackdown that the United Nations says has killed 5,000 people in the last nine months and has provoked Western and Arab League sanctions to isolate Damascus.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Russia offered the U.N. Security Council a new, stronger draft resolution on the violence in Syria, lifting Western hopes of U.N. action after the killing of 27 Syrian soldiers by deserters raised the spectre of a slide into civil war.

Western envoys said the Russian text was too weak, but they were willing to negotiate over it, offering the council a chance to overcome its deadlock and issue its first resolution on Syria’s nine-month-old crackdown on protesters.