DAMASCUS  - Fighting raged in several Syrian flashpoints on Wednesday as key Damascus ally Moscow lashed out the Syrian opposition for its "obsession" with toppling President Bashar al-Assad.
In a related development, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered to host an international conference aimed at aiding the more than 650,000 refugees the UN says have fled the 22-month conflict in Syria.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said five members of one family - a couple and three children - were killed in a dawn missile attack on the village of Abu Taltal in Aleppo province. The Observatory has previously reported more than 3,500 child deaths in Syria's conflict.
In Ras al-Ain in the Kurdish northeast, battles raged between Kurdish militia and rebels, the Observatory said, adding that more than 58 people have been killed in a week of fierce fighting there. The main opposition Syrian National Coalition, which has been recognised by dozens of states and organisations as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people, said it has contacted rebel leaders in the area, urging them to stop the fighting.
Wednesday's violence came a day after at least 123 people were killed, among them 62 civilians including 15 children, said the Observatory. The UN says more than 60,000 people have died since the conflict first erupted in March 2011.
In Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov criticised Syria's opposition for its "obsession" with toppling Assad, and warned of a long conflict. "For now, everything is running up against the opposition's obsession with toppling Bashar Assad's regime. As long as this irreconcilable position remains in place, nothing good can happen. Armed actions will continue and people will die," Lavrov told reporters.
He said that the opposition's insistence on ousting Assad was stymying efforts to find a diplomatic solution backed by the former international peace envoy Kofi Annan and his successor Lakhdar Brahimi.
His comments came as New York-based advocacy group Human Rights Watch warned that rebel groups appeared to have destroyed or allowed the looting of minority religious sites in northern Syria.
"The destruction of religious sites is furthering sectarian fears and compounding the tragedies of the country," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at the New York-based HRW.
And as the UN said on Wednesday that more than 650,000 people have already fled Syria to neighbouring countries such as Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, President Vladimir Putin of Russia offered to host an international conference in Moscow on the refugee crisis. "If the interested nations agree to this, we will be ready to propose Moscow as the venue," news agencies quoted Putin as saying.
The UN and Arab League chiefs, meanwhile, pledged "total support" to beleaguered Syria envoy Lakhdar Brahimi as he struggles to launch political talks to try to end the country's civil war. Brahimi, UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon and his Arab League counterpart Nabil al-Arabi spoke by telephone on Wednesday about the civil war. The three held "an in-depth discussion on the deteriorating crisis in Syria," said UN deputy spokesman Eduardo del Buey. "The two secretaries general expressed total support for the efforts of Mr Brahimi in his exceptionally difficult task in helping to find a political solution to the crisis in Syria," the spokesman added.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation meanwhile warned that Syrian agriculture has been shattered by the conflict, putting the livelihoods of about half of the country's population at risk.
The UN says that about 80 percent of 10 million Syrians - about 46 percent of the population - derive their livelihoods from agriculture.
A senior Nato officer said Wednesday Nato Patriot missiles deployed in Turkey to protect against a spillover of the conflict in neighbouring Syria will be operational this weekend.
"We expect to have an initial operating capability this weekend, that's what we're aiming at. This is when we will have the capability to defend some aspects of the population," said British Brigadier General Gary Deakin.
The first two Patriot missile batteries to operate have been supplied by The Netherlands and will deploy in the southern city of Adana, arriving on station at the weekend to plug in to the Nato command and communication network, he said. Two German Patriot missile batteries will be positioned in the southeastern province of Kahramanmaras while a further two US batteries will stationed in Gaziantep, just 50km north of the border.