BBC Online :
Activists in Syria have reported a surge in fighting across the country, amid attempts to broker a peace deal in Geneva.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said more than 200 people had been killed every day for the past three weeks.
Both government forces and rebels were trying to gain territory, it said.
This was possibly to strengthen their negotiating position at the peace talks, it added.
The talks between the Syrian government and opposition groups are continuing in Switzerland, but there is no sign of a breakthrough.
At least 4,959 people had died in the three-week period since 22 January, the SOHR reported. About a third of the casualties were civilians, including 515 women and children.
That casualty rate was higher, the group added, than in any other three-week period since the conflict began in March 2011. The claim by the British-based group – which has links to the opposition – has not been independently verified.
On Wednesday, the UN-backed evacuation of civilians and delivery of aid continued in the besieged rebel-held Old City area of Homs.
More than 200 civilians left, joining hundreds allowed out since a truce was agreed on Friday.
But concerns remain over the fate of men of military age who are being held by the Syrian authorities after attempting to leave.
Also on Wednesday, Syrian government troops – backed by their Lebanese Shia ally Hezbollah – stepped up an assault on the strategic opposition-held town of Yabroud, near the Lebanese border, with at least 13 air strikes reported.
Lebanese officials told the BBC dozens of families were streaming over the border in anticipation of a major offensive.
