French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe is to head to New York on Tuesday to press the U.N. Security Council into taking action over the Syrian regime's "crimes against humanity", his ministry said.

Juppe will seek "to persuade the Security Council to assume its responsibilities faced with the Syrian regime's worsening crimes against humanity," ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said on Monday.

Security forces have executed Free Syrian Army colonel Hussein Harmush, a founder of the rebel group made up of soldiers who defected, the Syrian League for Human Rights said on Monday.

"An air force intelligence unit last week carried out a sentence to shoot dead officer Hussein Harmush," the non-governmental group said in a statement.

Iran has developed laser-guided artillery rounds designed to home in on stationary or moving targets at a distance of up to 20 kilometers (12 miles), Defense Minister Ahmed Vahidi told state media Monday.

State television showed images of artillery being fired, saying it showed the precision-guided ammunition in action.

Saudi Arabia beheaded a Pakistani man who was arrested as he tried to smuggle drugs into the ultra-conservative kingdom, the interior ministry said on Monday.

"Salman Khan Taj Mohammed, a Pakistani... was arrested as he was caught smuggling a large amount of heroin" into the country, the ministry said in a statement carried by state news agency SPA.

The head of the world's largest Muslim body urged the international community on Monday to take up its responsibilities in protecting Syrian civilians and ending bloodshed there.

"I renew my calls to the international community, especially the U.N. Security Council, to take up its responsibilities in protecting civilians and taking all measures to end bloodshed in Syria," the secretary general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, told Agence France Presse.

At least 95 civilians, six members of the security forces, and two deserters were killed in violence across Syria on Monday, activists and a rights group said.

Security forces killed 95 people, including eight children and a woman, the Local Coordination Committees, the main activist group spurring protests on the ground, said.

Israeli forces on Monday demolished a home in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, residents told Agence France Presse.

The home, a makeshift structure in the Arab neighborhood, was knocked down by bulldozers that moved in around 6.30 am (04:30 GMT), according to the Samara family, who had been living in the building.

Iraqi officials have expressed outrage at the United States' use of a small fleet of surveillance drones to help protect the U.S. embassy, consulates and American personnel in Iraq, The New York Times reported late Sunday.

The newspaper said the State Department began operating some drones in Iraq last year on a trial basis and stepped up their use after the last U.S. troops left the country in December.

Troops at the headquarters of Yemen's elite Republican Guard opened fire on Sunday at a protest by soldiers demanding the ouster of their brigade chief over corruption charges, a military source said.

Soldiers from the fourth brigade of the Republican Guard were demanding the removal of Abdul Malek al-Arar and another top officer named Abdullah al-Hamiya, the source said, adding that no casualties were reported in the shooting.

One of the most sophisticated drones in the Israeli military crashed by accident in a field on Sunday, without causing casualties, an army spokeswoman said.

"An Eytan (meaning "strong" in Hebrew) crashed by accident into a field today in Israel during a test being carried out jointly by the army and Israel Aerospace Industries. There were no injuries," the spokeswoman told Agence France Presse.