Russia's foreign minister said Saturday that Syrian President Bashar Assad has no intention of stepping down and it would be impossible to try to persuade him otherwise.
A government airstrike on a bakery in a rebel-held town in central Syria killed more than 60 people on Sunday, activists said, casting a pall over a visit by the international envoy charged with negotiating an end to the country's civil war.
The international envoy tasked with ending Syria's civil war hoped to discuss ways of ending the crisis during a visit to Damascus that began Sunday, officials said, but there appeared little reason for optimism.
Syrian government forces are carrying out a broad offensive against rebels in the suburbs of Damascus, the state media said Wednesday, as the United Nations appealed for a billion dollars to support rising numbers of Syrian refugees.
Syrian fighter jets bombed a Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus Tuesday for the second time this week after rebels made significant advances, seizing large areas within the camp.
NBC's chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel said Tuesday he and members of his network crew escaped unharmed after five days of captivity in Syria, where more than a dozen pro-regime gunmen dragged them from their car, killed one of their rebel escorts and subjected them to mock executions.
NBC's chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel said he and his television crew were kidnapped for five days by pro-regime gunmen who subjected them to mock executions and kept them bound and blindfolded. They escaped during a firefight between their captors and rebels and reached Turkey on Tuesday.
NBC was able to keep the abduction of chief Middle East correspondent Richard Engel in Syria largely a secret until he escaped late Monday because it persuaded some of this country's most prominent news organizations to hold back on the story.
Syrian fighter jets bombed a Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus on Tuesday for the second time this week after rebels made significant advances, seizing large areas within the camp, activists said.
