Syria | featured news

Syrian security forces opened fire Friday on protesters and hunted them down in house-to-house raids, killing about 30 people in the deadliest day in weeks in the country's 7-month-old uprising, activists said.

More than 30 civilians and as many as a dozen soldiers were killed Monday in an upsurge of violence in Syria, most of them in the central city of Homs that is rapidly emerging as the epicenter of armed resistance to the government led by President Bashar al-Assad.

The United Nations' top human-rights official assailed the Syrian government Friday for a campaign of "ruthless repression and killings" and called for the international community to take steps to prevent the nation from plunging into "full-blown civil war."

A Syrian-born, naturalized U.S. citizen has been indicted on charges of spying on American activists opposed to the Syrian regime.

The United States called for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to "step down now" following the assassination of a prominent Kurdish opposition figure amid continuing violence in the nation.

A leading Kurdish political figure was shot to death in northern Syria, while a political dissident was brazenly beaten in the heart of the capital Damascus, activists said.

Zainab Alhusni, the young woman reportedly slain and mutilated while in Syrian custody, appears to be very much alive.

Russia and China vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution Tuesday that threatened sanctions against Syria if it didn't immediately halt its military crackdown against civilians.

Harvard University's website was hacked this morning in what appeared to be a Syrian-related attack.

The Obama administration is trying to avoid a repeat of what happened in Iraq, where the United States was not fully prepared for the aftermath of a leader’s fall.