More than 90 people, including 25 children, have been killed in a Syrian government "massacre", opposition activists have claimed.
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that Friday's shelling in the city of Houla, in central Homs province, had led to what seemed to be one of the bloodiest episodes so far of the 15-month long uprising.
Unconfirmed amateur videos posted by activists on YouTube showed around 20 bodies, mostly young children, lying in a room. One man holds up the limp body of a boy aged around seven, a gaping hole punched in the lower portion of his face. "This child, what did he do to deserve this?", he shouts.
Other footage shows the corpses of men and women lying under patterned blankets, including what is said to be one entire family. "We're being slaughtered like sheep here," says one voice. "Where are the UN observers?" adds another.
The latest flare-up of violence came as Kofi Annan, the United Nations-Arab League envoy to Syria who brokered a repeatedly violated ceasefire last month, finalised plans to return to Damascus.
The fresh claims of regime atrocities led the opposition Syrian National Council to call on the UN Security Council to take urgent action. At the same time, the Observatory accused the Arab and international communities of being "complicit" in the killing, saying that shelling that had begun on Friday had continued into the night. The Observatory said the international community was standing "silent in the face of the massacres committed by the Syrian regime."
Human rights monitors said the regime also deployed tanks to Aleppo, Syria's second largest city, for the first time since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began last March. Aleppo, Syria's economic hub, has previously been largely a bastion of support for the regime.
There was no immediate independent confirmation of the opposition accounts, which the Syrian government often claims are exaggerated. Damascus has restricted access for foreign journalists during the anti-regime protests.
In a briefing to the UN Security Council, Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary General, conceded there had been little progress in efforts to organise a ceasefire and that fighting was likely to continue as rebels held "significant" portions of several cities.
Mr Annan brokered a peace deal last month but it has had little impact and more than 1,500 people have been killed since it was announced, according to the Observatory.
Describing the killing in Houla, Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the monitoring group, said: "It was a real massacre that took place and the UN observers are just staying silent."
He added said helicopter gunships also went into action against rebels, strafing mountain villages in the Latakia area of northwestern Syria, near the Turkish border, wounding at least 20 people.
At least four policemen were killed in clashes with rebels in nearby Kansebba, he said.
Hours after massive anti-regime rallies across Aleppo, tanks deployed in the city, rumbling through the Kalasse and Bustan al-Kasr neighbourhoods after thousands attended a funeral, the monitoring group said.
Earlier it reported that a young man was killed in Aleppo when troops fired with live rounds and tear gas on protesters in the city.
Mr Abdel Rahman told AFP in Beirut that the protests in Aleppo were "the most important" in the city since the uprising started in March 2011.
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