Syrian forces open fire on civilian protestors on Turkish border

At least 10 farm workers were killed when Syrian security forces attacked in the southern province of Daraa on Thursday for no apparent reason, activists have claimed.

Heavy gunfire was also heard inside a military airport near the capital Damascus, the activists said, as the Syrian army begins a major offensive in the north west, AFP reports.

Dozens of Syrian army tankers and hundreds of soldiers began storming villages on the Turkish border, Euro News reports.

The Daraa attack is the latest report of civilian deaths in a drawn-out anti-government protest that began in March.

Army troops were also heavily deployed in the flashpoint city of Homs as 12 personnel carriers moved into the city, AFP reports.

Armed with heavy machine guns, the Syrian soldiers cut off roads leading to several villages, setting up checkpoints and arresting several people, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said, al Jazeera reports.

A boy was killed in the village of Janudiya when security forces opened fire to break up protesters, the Syrian Revolution General Commission, a grassroots activists' organization, said, al Jazeera reports.

AFP reports:

At least 12 people were killed in swoops by security and military forces across Syria on Wednesday, according to the Local Coordination Committees, a network of opposition activists.

Omar Idlibi, a spokesman for the Local Coordination Committees, said that "demonstrations will grip all Syria on Thursday marking six months since the uprising erupted against the regime" of President Bashar al-Assad.

"Six months. More than ever determined to continue the March 15 uprising," activists wrote on Facebook page The Syrian Revolution 2011, a motor of the popular revolt.

More than 40 people were arrested in the Jabal al-Zawiya region of Idlib, according to Idlibi who lives in Lebanon.

An estimated 2,600 people – mostly civilians – have been killed since protests started in Syria in mid-March, according to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay.