At Least 21 Civilians, 3 Troops Killed in Violence across Syria

At least 21 civilians and three soldiers were killed on Wednesday in violence across Syria, activists said, 13 days after a tenuous truce came into effect.

Regime forces killed six people in the northwestern province of Idlib, four in the Damascus suburbs of Harasta and Douma, four in the southern province of Daraa, three in the northern province of Aleppo, two in the central province of Hama, a person in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor and another in the central province of Homs, the Local Coordination Committees, the main activist group spurring protests on the ground, reported.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said four people were killed on a bus raked with gunfire by security forces at a checkpoint near Khan Sheikhun, a town in the restive northwestern province of Idlib. Another person was reportedly killed by gunfire in the village of Shatouria.

In the southern province of Daraa, violent clashes erupted between armed rebels and government forces in the town of Bosra al-Sham, the Britain-based watchdog said.

Heavy machinegun fire and shelling by regime forces was reported, with an elderly man killed when his home was hit by a mortar, and another person dying in the clashes.

Three soldiers were killed in clashes with armed rebel groups and one citizen was killed by random shooting in the town of Tafas, also in Daraa, according to the Observatory.

One child died after being struck by gunfire in a village in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor.

And regime forces shot dead one citizen in the town of Rastan, in the central province of Homs, the Observatory reported.

In Douma, a northeastern suburb of Damascus, the NGO said two citizens, including a teenage girl, were killed by sniper fire, with regime forces conducting raids, searching for people wanted by the authorities.

It was unclear whether U.N. monitors, who visited Douma on Wednesday, were present before or after the shootings and raids took place.

In another Damascus suburb, Harasta, two civilians were killed by regime forces.

The violence in Syria, which continues despite the hard-fought ceasefire and the presence of U.N. monitors, has claimed more than 9,000 lives since anti-regime protests erupted in March 2011, according to U.N. estimates.