U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday called for U.N. Security Council sanctions on Syria, saying there was no excuse for inaction when people were being “tortured and murdered” by their government.

"For the sake of Syria -- and the peace and security of the world -- we must speak with one voice. Now is the time for the United Nations Security Council to sanction the Syrian regime, and to stand with the Syrian people," Obama told the United Nations General Assembly.

Anti-Gadhafi fighters on Wednesday admitted heavy losses and hospitals full of wounded from their assault on the deposed Libyan despot's hometown of Sirte, forcing them to send abroad critically hurt troops.

At least 45 National Transitional Council (NTC) fighters have been killed and more than 200 wounded -- mostly by explosions or gunfire -- since they launched an offensive against Sirte last week, medics in Misrata said.

Protesters disrupted traffic in the Bahraini capital's central business district on Wednesday as part of efforts to step up pressure ahead of weekend by-elections, activists and witnesses said.

The demonstration was called by an Internet-based youth group that was one of the main engines of a Shiite-led uprising crushed by the Sunni-ruled kingdom's security forces earlier this year.

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards said on Wednesday that they had now cleared northwestern Iran's border area of armed Kurdish rebels, who are based in Iraq.

"Following numerous and powerful operations against the PJAK terrorist group, the Revolutionary Guards were able to clean the northwestern border area of this terrorist group...," said the Guards' website Sepahnews, quoting the Commander of the Guards forces in that area, Brigadier General Mohammad Taqi Osanlou.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has submitted a list of requests for help from the United States to counter Kurdish separatists, Anatolia news agency said Wednesday.

"There is a list of requests we have conveyed to them regarding the fight against the PKK," Erdogan was quoted as saying by Anatolia, referring to the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), blacklisted as a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

Artillery fire and shelling rocked Yemen's capital Wednesday despite a truce aimed at ending fighting between rival military units and deadly attacks on anti-regime protesters, witnesses said.

The fighting erupted in Achrine Street, whose residents include Vice President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, who had declared the truce late on Tuesday, the witnesses told Agence France Presse.

Thousands of Palestinians on Wednesday were gathering across the West Bank for rallies in support of the campaign to join the United Nations as the 194th member state.

In Ramallah, the political capital of the West Bank, thousands of people were heading for the city Centre, waving flags and chanting slogans, for a rally expected to start late morning, an AFP correspondent said.

Libya's new rulers said on Wednesday that their fighters have overrun the key southern city of Sabha, one of the last strongholds of forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi.

"We are in complete control of the city of Sabha. Everybody, including (those who were) pro-Gadhafi, are now with the revolution," Abdelmajid Seif Ennasr, an official for the National Transitional Council in Sabha, told Agence France Presse.

The United States is building an array of secret new drone bases to conduct strikes against al-Qaida targets in Somalia and Yemen, according to the Washington Post.

One of the new installations is being set up in Ethiopia, a close U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamist Shebab that controls much of Somalia, while another is being established in the Seychelles, the Post reported late Tuesday.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday said that for progress to be made in the thorny clash at the United Nations over Palestinian statehood, both sides will have to give.

"It's up to us, and mainly to our counterpart, the Palestinian leadership, Mahmud Abbas, and to others, to show the leadership and start to move," Barak told CNN television.