BBC News
with Stewart Macintosh
叙利亚安全部队袭击德拉的奥迈里清真寺
Residents of the Syrian city of Deraa say the army has seized control of a mosque associated with anti-government protesters. Witnesses said troops backed by tanks
stormed
the Omari mosque. As Western journalists have been denied permission to enter Syria, Owen Bennett-Jones reports from neighbouring Lebanon.
Residents of Deraa say the
assault on
the mosque involved sustained heavy gunfire, after which the army placed gunmen on the mosque's roof. Deraa has been under a virtual siege since Monday. With no one allowed to hold funerals, bodies are being stored in
makeshift morgues
. But as the residents try to cope with their worsening conditions, the new Syrian Prime Minister Adel Safar has been talking about political reforms. He said new important legislation would soon be approved concerning the law of the parties and the media. Syria is currently a one-party state with a tightly controlled media.
穆斯林兄弟会组新党剑指议会
The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt says it'll
contest
half of all the seats in the first parliamentary elections of the post-Mubarak era, which are due in September. But the movement, which was banned in 1954, says its new Freedom and Justice Party won't compete in the presidential election later in the year. From Cairo, Jonathan Head reports.