At least 14 civilians and three soldiers have been killed in violence across Syria, a rights watchdog said, 13 days after a tenuous truce came into effect.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said four people were killed on a bus raked with gunfire by security forces at a checkpoint near Khan Sheikhun, a town in the restive northwestern province of Idlib.
Another person was reportedly killed by gunfire in the village of Shatouria.
In the southern province of Daraa, violent clashes erupted between armed rebels and government forces in the town of Bosra al-Sham, the Britain-based watchdog said.
Reports from Syria cannot be independently verified as state authorities have barred international journalists and rights groups.
Heavy machinegun fire and shelling by regime forces was also reported, with an elderly man killed when his home was hit by a mortar, and another person dying in the clashes.
Three soldiers were killed in clashes with armed rebel groups and one citizen was killed by random shooting in the town of Tafas, also in Daraa, according to the Observatory.
At least 14 civilians and three soldiers have been killed in violence across Syria, a rights watchdog said, 13 days after a tenuous truce came into effect.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said four people were killed on a bus raked with gunfire by security forces at a checkpoint near Khan Sheikhun, a town in the restive northwestern province of Idlib.
Another person was reportedly killed by gunfire in the village of Shatouria.
In the southern province of Daraa, violent clashes erupted between armed rebels and government forces in the town of Bosra al-Sham, the Britain-based watchdog said.
Reports from Syria cannot be independently verified as state authorities have barred international journalists and rights groups.
Heavy machinegun fire and shelling by regime forces was also reported, with an elderly man killed when his home was hit by a mortar, and another person dying in the clashes.
Three soldiers were killed in clashes with armed rebel groups and one citizen was killed by random shooting in the town of Tafas, also in Daraa, according to the Observatory.
One child died after being struck by gunfire in a village in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor.
And regime forces shot dead one citizen in the town of Rastan, in the central province of Homs, the Observatory reported.
In Douma, a northeastern suburb of Damascus, the NGO said two citizens, including a teenage girl, were killed by sniper fire, with regime forces conducting raids, searching for people wanted by the authorities.
It was unclear whether UN monitors, who visited Douma today, were present before or after the shootings and raids took place.
In another Damascus suburb, Harasta, two civilians were killed by regime forces.
Meanwhile, France has warned that UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan's peace plan for Syria was "seriously compromised" and said it wanted UN monitors deployed within a fortnight and not in three months.
"Things are not going well, the Annan plan is strongly compromised but there is still a chance for this mediation, on the condition of the rapid deployment of the 300 monitors," Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said.
Mr Annan had earlier today called for the rapid deployment of the monitors.
Mr Annan said Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has still not fulfilled a promise to end violence and said the situation was "bleak" and "unacceptable". He added that he was "particularly alarmed" at reports that government forces had entered the city of Hama after a visit by UN monitors and killed "a significant" number of people.
The UN Security Council voted on Saturday to send the full UNSMIS force, only days after UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called for 300 monitors.
Mr Annan brokered a cessation of hostilities which started on 12 April, but the killing has continued, strengthening the doubts of Western nations that Assad will halt his crackdown on a 13-month-old uprising.
The UN says well over 9,000 people have been killed.
