Amid escalating violence between Syrian government troops and rebel forces, this week the international community renewed its call for a peaceful settlement to the crisis.

Suburbs of capital Damascus and the northern province of Aleppo have seen new clashes, as state news agency SANA said government forces launched new operations against insurgent groups.

SANA also reported that the military initiated a "qualitative operation" in eastern part of Aleppo, in which several armed rebels were killed, and 10 trucks equipped with machine guns were destroyed.

As many as 53 Syrians were killed on Friday alone, according to the Local Coordination Committees, an activists' network.

Also on Friday, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) announced that registered Syrian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey have reached nearly 230,000.

"The agency and its partners are working to expand the site to receive more arrivals and improve conditions there", UNHCR spokesman Farhan Haq told a daily news briefing in New York, adding that sanitation equipments, bedding, water and food are in desperate need in eight refugee shelters in Damascus.

As the prolonged conflicts have worsened the humanitarian conditions in Syria and caused exodus of refugees to neighboring countries, international calls for peaceful settlement to the Syria crisis run high.

On the same day, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov urged an immediate ceasefire by all parties in Syria to end the civilians' suffering, saying an early start of political talks shall "engage Syrians themselves and be based on the consensus reached by the international community."

"Unilateral economic sanctions imposed by some countries and regional associations seriously complicated the lives of ordinary Syrians," Bogdanov added.

Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi on Friday said political dialogue was the only right way to solve the Syria crisis, urging all parties to fully implement relevant UN Security Council resolutions, Annan's six-point peace plan and the Geneva communique of the Action Group.

Yang made the remarks during a telephone conversation with Lakhdar Brahimi, the new U.N.-Arab League special envoy to Syria.

At the 16th Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit in Tehran, Ma Zhaoxu, China's Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs, said that the international community should abide by the UN Charter and other international laws when dealing with Syria issue, in order to help promote political dialogue and bridge divisions in the war-torn country.

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