Iran has escalated its crackdown on freedom of expression ahead of this week's parliamentary election, Amnesty International said in a report published on Tuesday.

"In Iran today you put yourself at risk if you do anything that might fall outside the increasingly narrow confines of what the authorities deem socially or politically acceptable," said Ann Harrison, interim deputy director of Amnesty's Middle East and North Africa program.

Efforts to evacuate foreign journalists from the rebel-held Baba Amr district of the flashpoint city of Homs failed on Monday, a Western diplomatic source in the Syrian capital said.

"The evacuation of journalists did not take place but three wounded Syrians were able to leave in Syrian Red Crescent ambulances," the source said.

Syrian security forces and pro-regime gunmen killed 125 people across the country on Monday, among them 68 in a "massacre" in the rebel central province of Homs, activists and a rights group said.

"Sixty-eight civilians were killed today in the western countryside of Homs, in a rural area between the villages of Ram al-Enz and Ghajariyeh, and were taken to the state hospital in the city of Homs," said Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Israel's new ambassador to Egypt, Yaakov Amitai, presented on Monday his credentials to Egypt's ruling Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, Israel's foreign ministry said.

According to a statement, Amitai and Tantawi "exchanged words through which they emphasized the importance of the peace agreement and cooperation to both countries."

Almost 90 percent of voters approved Syria's new constitution brought in after 11 months of anti-regime protests, the interior minister announced on Monday.

Mohammed al-Shaar also told a press conference that turnout reached 57.4 percent of eligible voters, with 89.4 percent of the 8.376 million who cast their ballots in Sunday's referendum saying "yes" to the new constitution.

Saudi Arabia on Monday accused some countries of being complacent regarding the bloodshed in Syria.

"The kingdom holds all parties that delay international action (on Syria) morally responsible for developments there, especially if they continue being complacent and ignore the interests of the Syrian people," a statement said.

International diplomats at the U.N. Human Rights Council on Monday ramped up the pressure on the Syrian regime to allow the delivery of aid to civilians caught up in the bloodshed.

"We hope there will be a positive response from the Syrian authorities so that we can help all those affected" by the violence, council president Laura Dupuy Lasserre said as delegates met in Geneva.

France said on Monday that it wants to see the Syrian regime dragged before an international court of justice, as Qatar announced it was in favor of delivering arms to rebels battling the Syrian government.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, speaking during a break in talks between EU foreign ministers, said he would plead for legal action during a visit later Monday in Geneva, where he will attend the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Iraqi Kurdistan said on Monday it has granted refugee status to 30 Kurdish Syrian troops who defected to the region in the first such instance in the revolt against Bashar Assad's regime.

The autonomous Kurdistan region in north Iraq pledged it would not hand over the soldiers to Damascus after they crossed over in the past two days.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Monday its teams have succeeded in entering the central Syrian city of Hama for the first time in over a month.

A Red Cross spokesman in Geneva said a joint team of the ICRC and Syrian Arab Red Crescent brought an emergency delivery of food and other items for 12,000 people.