Rebel groups in Syria appeared to have deliberately destroyed or allowed the looting of minority religious sites in the north in November and December 2012, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

"The destruction of religious sites is furthering sectarian fears and compounding the tragedies of the country, with tens of thousands killed," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at the New York-based HRW.

Russian President Vladimir Putin offered on Wednesday after meeting with President Michel Suleiman to host an international conference in Moscow on the refugee crisis in Syria sparked by the conflict between rebels and the regime.

"If the interested nations agree to this, we will be ready to propose Moscow as the venue," news agencies quoted Putin saying.

Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji renewed on Wednesday the army's commitment to steering Lebanon clear from regional conflicts and providing the sufficient protection ahead of the upcoming parliamentary elections.

He said: “The army is committed to protecting the elections and the people's rights to express themselves under the political authority in order to preserve the country's unity, sovereignty, and independence.”

More than 650,000 people have fled the conflict in Syria, a top United Nations official said on Wednesday, as Turkey's foreign minister pledged Ankara would continue to accept refugees.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, U.N. aid chief Valerie Amos said the humanitarian situation in Syria was "already catastrophic and clearly getting worse".

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday lashed out at the Syrian opposition for its "obsession" with toppling President Bashar Assad which he said was holding up peace efforts in the country.

"For now, everything is running up against the opposition's obsession with toppling Bashar Assad's regime," Lavrov told reporters at his traditional start-of-year news conference.

Five members of one family -- a couple and three children -- were killed when a missile hit their village in Syria's northern province of Aleppo before dawn on Wednesday, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based watchdog identified the children as aged seven, nine and 11 and said they were killed in a strike on the village of Abu Taltal near the rebel-held town of Al-Bab.

The first Russian citizens evacuated from Syria arrived in Moscow overnight via the Rafik Hariri International Airport in Beirut.

The evacuation of 77 Russians was the first organized by Russia since the start of the Syrian conflict nearly two years ago, and it may be the beginning of what could become a difficult and dangerous operation to rescue tens of thousands of Russians living in Syria as rebels gain momentum in their fight to oust President Bashar Assad's regime.

Syrians on both sides of the conflict must take steps to protect the country's rich historical and archeological heritage stretching back thousands of years, a top U.S. official warned Tuesday.

"We are always concerned in situations like this. And we've seen it in other areas of conflict, whether it was in Afghanistan, or in Iraq," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

Syria's regime accused al-Qaida of being behind a deadly attack in Hama and criticized Turkey for sheltering what it called "terrorists," in a message to the U.N. aired by state television Tuesday.

"Armed terrorist groups headed by al-Qaida targeted citizens yesterday in the town of Salmiyeh in a cowardly terrorist act and destroyed the national hospital," the foreign ministry said in a letter to the U.N. secretary general and head of the Security Council.

At least 23 soldiers and pro-regime militiamen have been killed, and dozens wounded, in three days of fierce clashes in the central city of Homs, a flashpoint in Syria's conflict, a watchdog said Tuesday.

"We have reports from the military hospital in Homs of up to 130 soldiers and pro-regime fighters killed or wounded in the past three days," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.