Syrian rebels waged fierce battles with regime troops in a town along the Iraqi border today, capturing a string of security posts and the local police headquarters despite heavy government shelling and bombing runs by warplanes, activists said.

Government forces stormed a rebel-held town outside Damascus yesterday after days of fighting, killing at least 23 fighters, according to an activist group and a rebel spokesman.

A Syrian government official warned the United States today that military intervention in Syria could lead to regional turmoil as regime forces bombed a northern village and stormed a rebel-held Damascus suburb, killing dozens of people.

A Japanese journalist has been killed while covering Syria’s civil war.