The families of the pilgrims abducted in Syria issued a statement on Saturday condemning the delay of their release, holding Turkey responsible for it.

They held it responsible for maintaining the pilgrims’ safety and “ensuring their safe return to Lebanon as soon as possible.”

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday expressed concern that interminable unrest in Syria is "contributing to instability" in neighboring Lebanon.

Armed clashes between supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime have taken place in recent weeks in both the northern city of Tripoli and the capital Beirut.

Syria's main opposition bloc urged the U.N. Security Council on Saturday to convene an emergency meeting to examine what it called an army massacre near Homs, where it said 110 people were killed.

"More than 110 people were killed (half of whom are children) by the Syrian regime's forces" in the village of Houla, the Syrian National Council said in a statement.

Army tanks were deployed on Friday in Syria's second city Aleppo for the first time since an uprising against the regime erupted 14 months ago, a monitoring group said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the tanks rumbled through the Kalasse and Bustan al-Kasr neighborhoods of the northern city, where thousands of people attended a funeral.

Helicopter gunships on Friday fired on rebel positions in the Latakia area of northwestern Syria, near the Turkish border, wounding at least 20 people, a monitoring group said.

"This is the first time that this area, known as the Mountain of the Kurds, has been the target of air strikes," said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman.

Jubilation turned into anxious waiting in Lebanon on Friday after top officials said eleven Lebanese Shiite pilgrims abducted in Syria have been freed and conflicting reports emerged about the exact timing of their arrival in Beirut and about whether or not they were handed over to Turkish authorities.

According to a statement issue by Prime Minister Najib Miqati’s office, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu informed the premier that the pilgrims are doing well and that they were on their way to Beirut.

More than 70 people were killed across Syria on Friday, monitors said, as tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets and tanks were deployed in the country's second largest city.

The latest flare-up of violence came as Kofi Annan, the U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria who brokered a repeatedly-violated ceasefire last month, finalised plans to return to Damascus.

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon warned that the threat of the conflict in Syria might spill over into Lebanon amid the rise in security incidents in the country.

“We are very much worried about this kind of spillover effect,” Ban reiterated in an interview with CNN on Thursday night.

Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah is expected to tackle on Friday the latest developments in Lebanon and the region.

He will deliver his speech via video link to mark “Liberation Day” at a rally that will be held in the southern town of Bint Jbeil.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati said on Friday that the price of his resignation would be consensus among Lebanese on the dialogue table.

“I am ready to do whatever (the officials) agree on during the dialogue,” Miqati told al-Liwaa newspaper.