Bombs Go Off outside Damascus Justice Palace as Violence Kills 69

Violence killed at least 69 people, including 38 civilians, in Syria on Thursday after one of the bloodiest days of the 15-month revolt left nearly 150 dead, a human rights watchdog said.

Two bombs exploded outside the Palace of Justice in central Damascus on Thursday, state television reported.

The bombs, which it described as terrorist attacks, exploded in the car park outside the court complex in the al-Marjeh district, but a third did not explode.

A police source told Agence France Presse magnetic bombs exploded in two judges' cars in the open-air car park, while a third was in the process of being defused.

He said three people were hurt, without identifying them, and that 18 cars were damaged

Also in Damascus, a woman was killed by sniper fire, as military operations continued outside the capital, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Twelve members of the same family, including three children and four women were killed in shelling in the Damascus suburb of Douma, while six people and one rebel fighter were killed in shooting and clashes with regime forces attempting to storm the town, the Britain-based watchdog said.

Four civilians were killed elsewhere in the province in clashes and shooting.

And in the town of Irbin, four soldiers were killed in an ambush by rebels, the Observatory said.

In Deir Ezzor in the east, eight people were killed, including women and children, in shelling and fierce fighting between rebels and troops backed by helicopters in several neighborhoods of the city, the watchdog said.

Ten people were killed in the central province of Homs, including four rebels and two civilians who died in al-Hosn village amid clashes with government troops and militiamen.

The Local Coordination Committees, made up of activists on the ground, reported renewed shelling in Homs city and in Rastan, whose power and water systems are suffering "complete disruption".

In the southern province of Daraa, three people were killed in shelling and sniper fire, while in the northwestern province of Idlib, a rebel fighter and a civilian were killed by regime forces, the Observatory said.

Meanwhile, at least 19 member of the regime forces were killed in clashes with rebels in the provinces of Aleppo, Daraa, Deir Ezzor, Homs and Idlib.

The deaths came after at least 149 people, 77 of them civilians, were killed on Wednesday in one of the bloodiest days of the uprising, the Observatory said.

More than 15,800 people have been killed in Syria, the majority of them civilians, since the start of the uprising against President Bashar Assad's rule in March last year, according to the Observatory's figures.