Syrian Forces Kill 11, including 7 Civilians

Syrian regime forces killed Tuesday 11 people, including seven civilians, in shelling and attacks on the day the government is expected to pull out troops from protest hubs as per a U.N.-Arab League peace plan, a monitoring group said.

Six civilians were killed in shelling that hit the old district of Khaldiyeh, in Homs, and another was shot dead in the neighborhood of Bab Tadmur, also in the central city, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based center said regime forces shot four people in the village of Kfar Zeita, in the central Hama province, where troops loyal to President Bashar Assad carried out arrests.

It did not specify whether the dead were civilians or rebel fighters.

The forces loyal to President Bashar Assad were shelling Marea, in northern Aleppo province, after taking up positions around the village, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Britain-based Observatory, told Agence France Presse by telephone that "army tanks were shelling Marea, while helicopters hovered" over the village.

Mortar shells struck villages in the central province of Homs, he said, adding that it was relatively calm elsewhere, after one of the deadliest days in the Assad regime's crackdown on dissent.

Under the peace plan agreed with U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, the Syrian regime is supposed to withdraw its troops and armor from population centers on Tuesday ahead of a ceasefire on Thursday.

But Abdel Rahman noted that regime forces have yet to pull back from anywhere across the country on Tuesday, according to reports from witnesses on the ground.

And activists said that instead of withdrawing its forces, the Assad government was sending even more reinforcements into at least one other rebel stronghold, the besieged city of Rastan in central Homs province.

The Local Coordination Committees, one of the main opposition groups inside Syria, said "large military reinforcements" had arrived on the eastern outskirts of Rastan overnight.