World looks for ways to stop Syria's Assad

The international community is searching for new diplomatic approaches to stop the protracted conflict in Syria as activists report continued shelling of the rebellious city of Homs by regime forces.

The United States is working with its European and Arab allies to organise the inaugural meeting of the "Friends of Syria" to explore ways to further isolate President Bashar al-Assad, support his foes and end continuing violence.

The US State Department said its top Mideast envoy had been dispatched to Morocco, France and Bahrain to help put the meeting together.

A senior Arab League official said the Cairo-based organisation will discuss on Sunday whether to recognise the opposition Syrian National Council as the legitimate representative of Syria and whether to allow it to open offices in Arab capitals. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because no decision has been made on the issue.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the head of the Arab League plans to send observers back into Syria and has raised the possibility of a joint mission with the United Nations. Ban provided no specifics, but the idea appears aimed at giving the league a boost after its earlier mission was pulled out of Syria because of security concerns.

The Syrian regime's crackdown on dissent has left it almost completely isolated internationally as nations have imposed sanctions and withdrawn diplomats.

In the latest action, Libya on Thursday gave Syria's top envoy to the country and embassy staff 72 hours to leave, according to Libyan Foreign Ministry press officer Saad Elshlmani.

Also on Thursday, Germany expelled four Syrian diplomats following the arrest this week of two men accused of spying on Syrian opposition groups in the country.

Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said he ordered the expulsions of the four Syrian embassy employees. He has also expressed his support for a joint UN-Arab League mission to Syria.

The sanctions are crippling Syria's economy, but they have failed to stop the military offensives.

Assad has political backing from Russia and China, which delivered a double veto over the weekend in the UN Security Council that blocked a resolution calling on him to leave power.

The Syrian government blames the unrest on a foreign conspiracy by Israel and the West. It says armed gangs and terrorists are behind the uprising, not protesters seeking democratic change.

Syrian forces have fired mortars and rockets killing scores of people in Homs, activists said, the latest strike in a week-long assault as Assad's regime tries to crush increasingly militarised pockets of dissent.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees (LCC) were trying to compile numbers and names of those killed on Thursday. The LCC, an activist group, said up to 100 people were killed in Homs, but the toll was impossible to independently verify. The Observatory reported 63 deaths in Homs.

Activists also reported violence in the towns of Zabadani and Daraa.

There also are fears that the conflict is taking on dangerous sectarian overtones in some areas, including Homs.

Syria's 22 million people are overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim, but Assad and the ruling elite belong to the Alawite sect, which comprises about 10 per cent of the population.

The political domination by Alawites has bred seething resentment, which Assad tried to tamp down by enforcing the strictly secular ideology of his Baath Party.

But as the uprising surged, with Sunnis making up the backbone of the revolt, Assad called heavily upon his Alawite power base to crush the resistance, feeding sectarian tensions like those that fuelled civil wars in Iraq and Lebanon.