The number of Syrians fleeing their conflict-torn homeland has hit 5,000 a day, while overall numbers have risen by 25 percent in the past month alone, the U.N. refugee agency said Friday.

"Five thousand people are now crossing the border of Syria every single day," said Adrian Edwards, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi said on Thursday he hoped for a ceasefire "soon" in Syria, where tens of thousands of people have been killed in nearly two years of conflict.

Morsi said a meeting between Egypt, Turkey and Iran on the sidelines of a Cairo summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), discussed "the general framework" to resolve the crisis in Syria.

Egypt's interior minister on Thursday ordered extra security around opposition leaders Mohammed ElBaradei and Hamdeen Sabbahi after a religious edict calling for their deaths, a ministry spokesman said.

Mohammed Ibrahim issued the order to boost protection around the homes of leading dissident and former U.N. nuclear watchdog chief ElBaradei as well as former presidential candidate Sabbahi.

Hundreds of Egyptians marched Wednesday to demand an end to sexual violence against women, as Amnesty International urged an end to the culture of impunity following harrowing reports of mob attacks in Cairo.

Men and women, holding huge flags of famous Egyptian female icons, marched from Sayyeda Zeinab mosque to Tahrir Square chanting against the interior ministry, which is accused of failing to bring perpetrators to justice.

Iran's foreign ministry on Wednesday downplayed an incident in Cairo in which a protester tried to throw a shoe at President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, saying it did not indicate Egypt's official stance towards Tehran.

"What is important to us is the behavior of Egyptian officials and the nation, who respect the Islamic republic as a major power," the ISNA news agency quoted ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast as saying.

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi on Wednesday urged Syrian opposition groups to unify, as he addressed leaders of Islamic states at a summit that also tackled the battle against militants in Mali.

"The Syrian regime must draw lessons from history: it is the people who remain. Those who put their personal interests above the interests of their people will end up leaving," Morsi told heads of state and representatives of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Cairo.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta spoke by phone with his Egyptian counterpart on Tuesday to hear an update on the tense political situation in Cairo and the "role" of the army amid recent street demonstrations, a Pentagon spokesman said.

Defense minister and military chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, who has warned the state could collapse in the face of political upheaval, voiced support for maintaining strong security ties with Washington and reassured Panetta that the armed forces remained committed to his country's peace treaty with Israel, spokesman George Little said in a statement.

Egypt's top cleric told visiting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday not to interfere in the affairs of Bahrain or other Gulf states, and to uphold the rights of his country's Sunni minority.

Ahmed al-Tayyeb, the grand imam of Cairo's al-Azhar, Sunni Islam's highest seat of learning, also denounced what he described as the "spread of Shiism in Sunni lands".

Egypt's foreign reserves fell by almost 10 percent to $13.6 billion in January, the Central Bank of Egypt said on Tuesday, below what it had in December described as a "critical minimum" of $15 billion.

"Foreign reserves fell heavily by $1.4 billion to $13.61 billion in January, from $15 billion in December," the bank said in a statement carried by the official MENA news agency. It gave no reason for the fall.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad discussed the Syrian conflict with Egyptian counterpart Mohamed Morsi on Tuesday, in the first visit by an Iranian leader to Egypt in decades amid thawing relations.

Morsi, an Islamist who fiercely opposes Ahmadinejad's Syrian regime allies, met the Iranian leader in Cairo airport after his arrival for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation summit, footage on state television showed.