Syrian regime slaughters 88 people, including children, opposition says

Syrian regime slaughters 88 people, including children, opposition says

(CNN) -- Britain condemned the reported massacre of civilians in a Syrian town, saying Saturday it wants an urgent session of the U.N. Security Council and a full account of the "appalling crime."

His condemnation came shortly after opposition activists reported 40 people were killed across Syria on Saturday.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague cited "credible and horrific reports" that Syrian forces killed a large number of civilians, including children, in the town of Houla.

Syrian opposition activists reported at least 88 people, mostly children, were killed Friday by the Syrian regime's mortar shelling, and that the attacks left entire families dead.

The reports came from the Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a network of Syrian opposition activists. They said even more bodies were found Saturday near the reported massacre site.

"Our urgent priority is to establish a full account of this appalling crime and to move swiftly to ensure that those responsible are identified and held to account," Hague said in a statement.

"We are consulting urgently with our allies on a strong international response, including at the U.N. Security Council, the (European Union) and U.N. human rights bodies. We will be calling for an urgent session of the U.N. Security Council in the coming days.

"The Assad regime must ensure full and immediate access to Houla and other conflict areas in Syria for the U.N. monitoring team, and cease all military operations in full compliance with Joint Special Envoy's Kofi Annan's six-point plan," Hague said.

More regime attacks Saturday killed 40 people across the country, including 20 in Homs, just south of Houla, according to the Local Coordination Committees.

A caller to Syrian state television Saturday blamed the Houla massacre on criminal gangs and terrorist groups. An analyst on the station said al Qaeda and its branches are to blame and that "the Syrian military is the defender of the nation."

The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency made no mention of Houla but said 16 civilians were killed by "terrorists" on Friday across the country.

"We in the Local Coordination Committees are pained by the international community's apparent blindness to the bloodshed, and believe the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) bears the responsibility for its inability to protect Syrian civilians," the Local Coordination Committees said.

Months of U.N. Security Council attempts to resolve the Syrian crisis have so far failed to stop the bloodshed. Council members Russia and China have vetoed efforts to formally condemn President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

An unspecified number of U.N. monitors visited Houla on Saturday, according to the opposition Homs Coordination Committee, part of the LCC network.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday the full cadre of 300 U.N. observers authorized by the Council will be in Syria in the coming days.

Ban issued a sobering report Friday on the Syrian crisis, detailing "continuing reports of a stepped-up security crackdown by the authorities that has led to massive violations of humans rights ... including arbitrary arrests, torture, enforced disappearance and summary execution of activists, opponents and defectors."

In a letter to the head of the U.N. Security Council, obtained by CNN, Ban said he is deeply concerned that the Syrian violence has not stopped despite the presence of the monitors and the agreement by both sides to a peace plan.

Some of the violence has abated when the monitors are around, he said, but across the country the level of it is high.

The monitors have seen "considerable" physical destruction across Syria, Ban said. They have also seen continued Syrian Army troop concentrations and heavy weapons in population centers, in direct violation of the peace plan forged by former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in March.

Both sides blame the other for the destruction the monitors have seen, Ban said.

Some cities appear to be under opposition control, but Ban said residents are often too scared of reprisal to talk to the monitors, or they threaten the U.N. staff out of frustration with the ongoing crisis.

Ban said another key part of Annan's plan calling for the government to speed up the release of arbitrarily detained people hasn't happened. He said it was "unacceptable" that U.N. staff are unable to investigate numerous reports of detained or missing people.

Neither the government nor the opposition are granting total freedom of movement for journalists, and the regime is not allowing people to demonstrate peacefully, Ban said. Both are required under the peace plan.

As reports of deaths mount every day, so do the frustration and anger.

"It's unbelievable that we have 7 billion people on this planet, and they all can't do anything about what they are seeing on TV," activist Abu Emad told CNN from Homs early Saturday.

"Do something," he begged the international community.

Graphic video posted on YouTube purportedly shows the lifeless bodies of several small children killed in Houla. They are spread on the floor amid blankets, caked in blood. One child is turned to reveal a head wound.

"Look, these are just children. It is a massacre!" a man shouts.

CNN could not independently confirm the authenticity of the video, nor can it confirm reports from within the country because the government strictly limits access by foreign journalists.

U.N. officials say more than 9,000 people, mostly civilians, have died and tens of thousands have been uprooted since the uprising began in March 2011. Opposition groups report a death toll of more than 11,000 people.

Since al-Assad's government and opposition forces accepted Annan's peace plan in March, at least 1,635 people have been killed, the LCC said Saturday.

Following the reported massacre in Houla on Friday, the rebel Free Syrian Army implored members of the international "Friends of Syria" group to form a military coalition to launch airstrikes against al-Assad forces.

CNN's Saad Abedine, Richard Roth, Holly Yan, Joe Sterling and Hamdi Alkhshali contributed to this report.

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