Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Monday condemned as "hysterical" the West's angry reaction to a Russian veto of a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning the crackdown on protestors in Syria.

"Some comments from the West on the U.N. Security Council vote, I would say, are indecent and bordering on hysteria," Lavrov told reporters in Moscow. "Such hysterical comments are aimed at suppressing what is actually happening."

Foreign ministers from the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) will meet in the Saudi capital later this week to discuss developments in Syria, Oman's foreign minister said on Monday.

The announcement came just two days after China and Russia vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning a deadly crackdown by Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime on nearly 11 months of protests.

China on Monday denied U.S. accusations it was protecting the Syrian regime, after drawing international criticism for vetoing a U.N. resolution condemning a deadly crackdown on protests by Damascus.

Beijing called on both sides in the conflict to halt violence, after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused China and Russia of "protecting the brutal regime in Damascus", calling their veto of the resolution a "travesty".

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is to head an interim consensus government under a deal signed with Hamas on Monday, ending a long-running disagreement over the post that stalled Palestinian reconciliation.

The accord signed in Qatar was welcomed by officials from both rival Palestinian movements Hamas and Fatah, but Israel warned Abbas to choose between reconciliation with Hamas and making peace with the Jewish state.

Syrian forces rained rockets and shells down on protest hubs on Monday, activists said, as another 66 civilians died in the regime's crackdown on dissent.

The opposition Syrian National Council (SNC) said the regime was surrounding Homs with tanks ahead of "a major offensive" and warned of a "genocide" in the central Syrian city.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy defended his diplomatic record on Sunday ahead of an election in April, praising France's role in Europe and Libya but admitting that some errors had been made.

In a wide-ranging interview with French quarterly review Politique Internationale, Sarkozy highlighted what he said were diplomatic successes in reforming Europe, ending the 2008 war between Russia and Georgia and intervening in Libya.

Two southern activists were killed and seven wounded in clashes with police in the Yemeni province of Hadramut on Sunday, activists said.

They said the clashes took place in the city of Mukalla as security forces intervened to evacuate a police station overrun by activists opposed to Yemen's presidential election of February 21.

A judge has called for parliament to lift the immunity of an MP with the Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc, the deputy and a judicial spokesman said Sunday, at a time of crisis with Iraq's Shiite-led government.

Two other MPs who are opponents of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki also face arrest warrants and requests for their immunity to be lifted. Parliament is to vote on the three cases "soon", according to a parliamentary source.

Iran on Sunday welcomed the Russian and Chinese veto on a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning its ally Syria for its crackdown on dissent, the official IRNA news agency reported.

"By vetoing the proposed sanctions China and Russia have been just," Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said.

Turkey's deputy prime minister Bulent Arinc criticized Iran on Sunday for the country's silence over Syria's violent crackdown on protests.

"I am addressing the Islamic Republic of Islam: I do not know if you are worthy of being called Islamic," Arinc said, according to the Anatolia news agency.