U.N. to Send Observers to Syria

The Security Council unanimously agreed to send 300 cease-fire observers to Syria as soon as the U.N. secretary general determines it is safe, as an advance team visited the battered city of Homs for the first time.

Intense explosions rocked the devastated city of Homs early Monday, opposition activists said, just days after the U.N. Security Council voted to send as many as 300 observers to monitor a tenuous cease-fire in Syria.

Syrian rebels in the Golan Heights have captured a convoy of UN trucks and are demanding that Bashar al-Assad's forces to leave the area, James Miller of EA WorldView reports.

After months of failed attempts to stop the killings in Syria, the U.N. Security Council is expected Wednesday to endorse special envoy Kofi Annan's mission to the country -- a venture that brought the Syrian president to the table but has yet to yield a cease-fire.

UNITED NATIONS — The world moved closer to punishing North Korea for its latest nuclear test Tuesday as the United States introduced a draft resolution, backed by China, with new sanctions aimed at reining in Pyongyang’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs and preventing their export to other countries. In response, Pyongyang threatened to cancel the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War.

Syrians in the devastated city of Homs endured another day of heavy shelling Sunday, opposition activists said, a day after the U.N. Security Council voted to send up to 300 observers to monitor a shaky cease-fire.

In the aftermath of yesterday's surprising attack by Israel on Syrian soil, an act which any prior justification notwithstanding is a clear act of war sovereign aggression, it was only a matter of time before Syria responded, at least diplomatically at first.

The four European members of the U.N. Security Council present a revamped resolution condemning Syria for its crackdown on anti-government demonstrators.