A Syrian army colonel said on Saturday that he has defected with "hundreds" of soldiers and warned the regime against launching a crackdown on the eastern oil hub of Deir al-Zour.

The man, identifying himself as Colonel Riad al-Asaad, said in a telephone call to Agence France Presse in Nicosia that he was speaking from inside Syria "near the Turkish border."

Syrian troops shot dead three people on Saturday when villagers hurled stones at their convoy as it advanced on the eastern city of Deir al-Zour, an activist told Agence France Presse in Nicosia.

Rami Abdel Rahman, of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said a convoy of about 60 military vehicles, including tanks, was moving towards Deir al-Zour when people from Tibneh village attacked them with stones.

Lebanon's few remaining Arabic calligraphers, whose elegant script and interweaving words transport one to another era, are working to preserve an art form struggling to compete with new technology.

"The computer is a wonderful tool but in no way can it replace an artist or produce masterpieces," says Mahmoud Bayoun, one of the country's best-known calligraphers, whose works have been displayed in the United States and Iran.

A bomb blast struck an oil pipeline in western Syria on Friday in what Syrian state television described as a "terrorist" attack, saying that a group of "saboteurs" was behind the explosion.

The TV said the bombing targeted the pipeline in the western town of Talkalakh between the cities of Homs and Tartous, near the Tal Hosh dam. The explosion left a 33 feet (10 meter) deep crater, the TV said.

Syrian forces pressed their clampdown on the pro-democracy movement, killing two protesters and arresting two leading activists, rights groups said on Thursday, on the eve of more mass rallies.

In the eastern city of Deir Ezzor, where security forces were carrying out operations in nearly all neighborhoods, two civilians were shot dead on Thursday night, said Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Syria Observatory for Human Rights.

Some 300 supporters of the Baath Party, the Syrian Social Nationalist Party and Hizbullah on Thursday staged a demonstration in the Roueisat neighborhood in Northern Metn’s Jdeideh district in support of the embattled Syrian regime.

Demonstrators carried pictures of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun, Voice of Lebanon radio (100.5) reported.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Thursday extended a freeze of assets on persons “threatening stability in Lebanon.”

A White House statement, extending the freeze imposed in 2007, said that "certain ongoing activities, such as continuing arms transfers to Hizbullah that include increasingly sophisticated weapons systems, serve to undermine Lebanese sovereignty."

Almost 3,000 people have gone missing in Syria since the start of anti-regime protests more than four months ago, the Avaaz non-governmental organization said in a statement on Thursday.

"Avaaz has today revealed the identities of 2,918 Syrians who have been arrested by Syrian security forces and whose whereabouts are now unknown," the organization said in statement received by Agence France Presse in Nicosia.

Al-Qaida's new leader Ayman al-Zawahiri praised anti-regime protestors in Syria in a video released Wednesday claiming the United States is seeking regime change in Damascus, U.S.-based monitors said.

Calling the pro-democracy activists "mujahideen," or holy warriors, Zawahiri hailed their efforts in "teaching lessons to the aggressor, the oppressor, the traitor, the disloyal, and standing up against his oppression" in a video the SITE Intelligence Group said was posted on extremist online forums.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat expressed fear on Thursday that targeting the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) will cause a major vacuum in the south which will benefit Israel and endanger Lebanon.

Jumblat told As Safir newspaper that the attack on the UNIFIL is “suspicious” and it might be intended to cause vacuum in the south, which will lead to a minimized presence for these forces in the area.