Seven Killed in Fresh Violence across Syria

Seven more people died in fresh violence across Syria on Tuesday, including a civilian killed by security forces after three of their own were gunned down by suspected mutinous soldiers, activists said.

Syrian troops killed four civilians, including a child, as they hunted for militants and arrested 29 high school students in a raid in the southern province of Daraa, cradle of the anti-regime dissent, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

According to the Britain-based Observatory, the dead included a man killed after gunmen believed to be mutinous soldiers attacked a car transporting members of the security forces, killing three of them.

The gunmen also abducted two members of the security forces in the attack near the town of Saraqeb in the northwestern Idlib province, the Observatory added.

An eight-year-old girl was among two civilians killed in the flashpoint central city of Homs. She was struck by a stray bullet from a security checkpoint.

And a 33-year-old man was shot by a sniper in Rankuss near Damascus as he tried to flee the town, where at least 17 civilians have been killed since Sunday, the Observatory said.

"Residents are unable to bury their dead or take their wounded to hospital because they are afraid they will be arrested by the security forces who are massively deployed in the town," a statement said.

The violence prompted Saudi Arabia to order its citizens out of Syria.

"Due to the security situation, Saudi Arabia urges its citizens to leave Syria and not travel there," a statement from Riyadh's foreign ministry said.

Syria blames "armed terrorists" for the violence, and on Monday Foreign Minister Walid Muallem slammed Arab countries for ignoring these claims.

"The Arabs don't want to admit the presence in Syria of groups of armed terrorists who are committing these crimes, abductions and attacks on public places," he said.

Muallem's remarks came a day after the Arab League hit Syria with sweeping sanctions over the regime's failure to halt the bloodshed.

Muallem denounced the punitive measures as "economic war," but said Syria was capable of weathering the effects of the sanctions.