Syria rebels make U-turn on talks

Syria's opposition has taken a U-turn and cancelled a planned boycott of an international conference on the two-year conflict after appeals from Britain and the US, but rejected an offer of talks from Damascus.
US Secretary of State John Kerry and British Foreign Secretary William Hague convinced the opposition to revoke its boycott on a Friends of Syria conference in Rome on Thursday after an appeal at a joint press conference in London.
Syrian National Coalition chief Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib said on his Facebook page his group would attend after Kerry and Hague "promised specific aid to alleviate the suffering of our people".
The Coalition said on Saturday it was withdrawing from the 11-nation meeting and planned visits to Washington and Moscow in protest at the world's silence over the mounting civilian death toll in Syria.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem said in Moscow on Monday that the authorities in Damascus were ready to talk to armed rebels. But the rebel Free Syrian Army's chief of staff Selim Idriss dismissed Muallem's offer.
On the ground, fierce clashes erupted around the historic Umayyad Mosque in Syria's second city Aleppo.
Air strikes were also reported in the southern province of Daraa, the eastern outskirts of Damascus, the northwestern province of Idlib, the northern province of Raqa and the eastern city of Deir Ezzor.
The latest violence came after 154 people were killed nationwide on Monday: 54 civilians, 41 rebels and 59 regime troops, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.