Syria Red Crescent bid to rescue Homs journalists fails 
 
 Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. 
 
 Fresh attempts to evacuate two wounded Western journalists from Homs in Syria have failed, the Red Cross says. 
 
 Vehicles from the Syrian Red Crescent reached the besieged suburb of Baba Amr, but left without them. 
 
 Frenchwoman Edith Bouvier would not board vehicles, reports said, and other evacuees, including UK photographer Paul Conroy, stayed in solidarity. 
 
 Earlier, Syrian forces launched fresh attacks on a number of towns, reports say, with dozens more people killed. 
 
 The Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC), an activists' group which organises and documents protests, said a total of 125 people had died across Syria, many of them in a single incident at a checkpoint in Homs - although there has been no independent verification of this. 
 
 Broken leg 
 
 Reports on Monday evening said the Syrian Red Crescent had managed to regain access to Baba Amr but officials later confirmed they had left without the journalists. 
 
 Three Syrians, including a pregnant Syrian woman, her husband, and an elderly female patient, were moved to safety. 
 
 Continue reading the main story At the scene The bombardment has started in Binnish, which for the past week has been under the control of the opposition. The Free Syrian Army and the Syrian Liberation Army are based in this town. We know that a government offensive has been taking place in the nearby city of Idlib. The townspeople have become increasingly concerned that the troops would then turn their attention to Binnish. That is what has happened this morning. We were woken to the sound of artillery bombardment. There is gunfire in the distance. We believe they are using anti-aircraft weapons against the town, and also setting up mortar positions. This is a town of about 40,000 people and although there are militiamen belonging to the Free Syrian Army and other groups, this has not been a military situation. From what we can tell, the bombardment is entirely random and is not targeting specific individuals. This seems to be part of a wider government offensive that is taking place in the north of the country, to regain control of opposition areas. 
 
 Ms Bouvier suffered a broken leg and Mr Conroy was hit by shrapnel in the leg and stomach in an attack last Wednesday that claimed the lives of American Sunday Times journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik. 
 
 It had been hoped that the bodies of the two dead journalists would be brought out during the same mission, but this also failed. 
 
 The BBC's Jim Muir reports from neighbouring Beirut that Ms Bouvier refused to board the Red Crescent vehicles, and the others stayed behind out of solidarity. 
 
 Paul Conroy's wife said on Sunday that her husband had rejected an earlier opportunity to leave Homs with the Syrian Red Crescent as the photographer had been advised that they were "not to be trusted". 
 
 And the UK's International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell told the BBC there was evidence of people on the ground "infiltrating the Syrian Red Crescent" and "posing an additional danger" to injured people seeking to leave Homs. 
 
 Meanwhile, the LCC said 15 people had been killed in the Idlib area, nine in the Aleppo area, and several in the suburbs of Damascus. 
 
 Several towns in Idlib came under army assault for the first time, reports said. 
 
 BBC correspondent Ian Pannell, who is in northern Syria, says troops fired artillery, mortars and anti-aircraft guns at Binnish and other towns on Monday. 
 
 Binnish has been under the control of the Free Syrian Army and the Syrian Liberation Army for the past week. 
 
 Our correspondent says the bombardment, which began in the early morning, appeared to be entirely random, hitting civilian areas rather than targeting rebel positions. 
 
 The towns of Sarmin and Maarat al-Numan were also hit, reports said, along with the town of Qusayr, nine miles (15km) outside Homs. 
 
 Weapons call 
 
 As the crackdown intensified, the European Union imposed further sanctions on Syria. 
 
 They include: 
 
 a freeze on the European-held assets of the Syrian central bank 
 
 travel bans on seven close associates of President Bashar al-Assad 
 
 a ban on cargo flights from Syria into the EU 
 
 restrictions on the trade in gold and precious metals 
 
 UK Foreign Secretary William Hague welcomed the fresh sanctions. 
 
 "We will continue working closely with our EU partners to support the Arab League and its plan to end the violence in Syria and bring about a Syrian-led transition to a peaceful and more open political system," he said. 
 
 Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. 
 
 Qatar Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani said the international community should do "whatever necessary" to help the Syrian opposition, "including giving them weapons to defend themselves". 
 
 "I think they're right to defend themselves with weapons and I think we should help these people by all means," he added. 
 
 Syrian state television has meanwhile announced the results of a referendum on a new constitution, which was dismissed by opposition activists and the West as a sham. 
 
 The poll showed around 89% support for the proposal, the report said, on a turnout of just over 57%. ||||| Are you there? Send us your images or video. 
 
 (CNN) -- As the death toll from Syria's almost year-long uprising continues to climb, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem vowed to defend his country's "independence." 
 
 "We are not happy to see brothers killing each other. But this is our country. But we will defend our sovereignty and independence," he told reporters. 
 
 The minister said no one is dying in Syria because of hunger or sickness and that despite the "economic international boycott," his government is providing all necessary services. 
 
 "Do you think there is a government in this world ... (that cares) about Syrian people welfare more than the Syrian government? I don't see this logic," Moallem said. 
 
 As day broke on Tuesday, four people were killed across Syria, opposition activists said. At least 144 people were reported killed Monday, including 64 who died in a "horrifying massacre" at a checkpoint in Homs province. 
 
 Those killed at a checkpoint in the Abel area were attempting to flee shelling in the Baba Amr neighborhood in the city of Homs, said the Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a network of opposition activists. 
 
 "Reports said security members and thugs kidnapped the women among them," the network said in a statement. Residents found 47 corpses in one area and 17 in a second one, it said. 
 
 A total of 68 corpses were found in the area, in farmland in western Homs province, said the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, apparently referencing the same incident. The bodies were found after an injured survivor reported the attack, the group said. All the bodies had been either shot or stabbed. 
 
 In all, 104 people were killed Monday in Homs, an opposition stronghold, according to the LCC. They included four defected soldiers, three woman and three children. 
 
 The deaths came on a day when Syrian officials announced that the nation's new draft constitution received approval and the European Union imposed new sanctions on the country amid ongoing clashes. 
 
 The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said earlier explosions rocked Homs and shelling was occurring in Baba Amr. Twenty people were wounded when a large shell struck an anti-government gathering in Homs, the group said. 
 
 Meanwhile, Interior Minister Mohammed al-Shaar announced that 89.4% of voters approved the draft constitution, and 57.4% of eligible voters cast ballots. President Bashar al-Assad's regime has touted the constitutional referendum as a move toward reform. 
 
 Syria announced the referendum amid intense international cries to stop the bloodshed and open its regime to change. But analysts and protesters widely describe the effort as a farce, a superficial attempt to pacify al-Assad's critics. 
 
 "We dismiss it as absolutely cynical. ... Essentially, what he's done here is put a piece of paper that he controls to a vote that he controls so that he can try and maintain control," U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said of the referendum and al-Assad. 
 
 She cited the ongoing violence in such cities as Homs and Hama and asked: "How could you possibly have any kind of a democratic process in conditions like that?" 
 
 Aid efforts were under way in the midst of the violence. 
 
 The Syrian Red Crescent and the International Committee of the Red Cross entered the province of Hama on Monday to provide aid to civilians, said Simon Schorno, spokesman for the Red Cross. A one-month supply of food, along with blankets and hygiene kits, were distributed to 12,000 people, he said. 
 
 Beatrice Megevand-Roggo, the Red Cross' head of operations for the Middle East, said a handful of aid workers were also able to go into Baba Amr. 
 
 "There were four ambulances that entered Baba Amr, belonging to the Syrian Red Crescent. They were loaded with medical goods. They indeed were not able to evacuate the two foreign journalists. I don't have the reasons why. They could evacuate an elderly woman, a pregnant woman with her husband," she said. 
 
 The two journalists Megevand-Roggo was referencing were British photographer Paul Conroy and French reporter Edith Bouvier. Both were wounded in shelling. 
 
 Red Cross spokesman Hicham Hassan said aid workers were also not able Monday to recover and evacuate the bodies of two journalists killed in Baba Amr last week. 
 
 Marie Colvin, an American journalist who worked for London's Sunday Times, was killed in a shelling attack, along with French journalist Remi Ochlik. Colvin's mother, Rosemarie, said Sunday that aid workers have been trying for days to remove her daughter's body. 
 
 CNN and other media outlets cannot independently verify opposition or government reports because Syria has severely limited access to the country by foreign journalists. But the vast majority of reports from the ground indicate that government forces are massacring citizens in an attempt to wipe out civilians seeking al-Assad's ouster. 
 
 No attempts at getting al-Assad to stop his regime's crackdown on dissidents have stopped the onslaught. 
 
 The Council of the European Union agreed Monday on new sanctions regarding Syria after foreign ministers met in Brussels, Belgium, said spokeswoman Susanne Kiefer. 
 
 Seven ministers of the al-Assad regime will have their EU assets frozen and will be denied entry into the EU, Kiefer said. In addition, assets of the Syrian Central Bank in the EU will be frozen. Legitimate trade will be allowed to continue, she said, but must be authorized first. 
 
 "Today's decisions will put further pressure on those who are responsible for the ruthless campaign of repression in Syria," Catherine Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief, said in a statement. "The measures target the regime and its ability to conduct the appalling violence against civilians. As long as the repression continues, the EU will keep imposing sanctions." 
 
 Elsewhere in Syria on Monday, two people were killed and eight wounded by government shelling on the village of Sarmeen in Idlib province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. 
 
 The shelling began Sunday night, and Syrian troops have entered Sarmeen, said Abu Mustafa al-Sayed, a Syrian opposition and community leader in the town of Binnish, also in Idlib province. The Syrian army has Sarmeen surrounded, and communications with the residents have been cut off, he said. 
 
 And in Damascus, security forces fired on mourners at a funeral, according to the Local Coordination Committees. Clashes were also occurring in Deir Ezzor, the group said, and 14 students were arrested during a protest at Aleppo University. 
 
 The opposition network estimates that 9,000 people have been killed since the government launched its crackdown in March. The Syrian government says that more than 2,000 members of its security forces have been killed by "terrorists" during that same period. 
 
 Asked Monday whether Syria would be referred to the International Criminal Court, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said, "I hope the international community reflects on the conditions of referral. ... It's a difficult issue. Syria is not a participating state, so it's up to the Security Council to address this question. They must therefore continue to gather the elements that would permit an eventual referral." 
 
 CNN's Jo Shelley, Per Nyberg, Salma Abdelaziz, Jack Maddox, Hamdi Alkshali and Kareem Khadder and journalist Mohamed Fadel Fahmy contributed to this report. ||||| Image caption Paul Conroy was smuggled across the border into Lebanon and is said to be in good spirits. 
 
 Injured British journalist Paul Conroy has been rescued from the Syrian city of Homs, but the whereabouts of French reporter Edith Bouvier remain unclear. 
 
 French President Nicolas Sarkozy has withdrawn an earlier statement that she was also safely in Lebanon. 
 
 The severely-injured Ms Bouvier is believed to have left Homs with Mr Conroy, but there are reports the rescue convoy was shelled. 
 
 The UN meanwhile says more than 7,500 people have now died in the crackdown. 
 
 UN human rights chief Navi Pillay said atrocities against civilians were being committed, and she had received reports that "massive campaigns of arrests" by Syrian troops against rebels had deprived many civilians of food, water and medical supplies. 
 
 Her comments came at an emergency meeting of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva, which renewed calls for a humanitarian ceasefire. 
 
 Syria's representative to the UN, Faysal Khabbaz Hamoui, stormed out of the session, accusing countries of "inciting sectarianism and providing arms". 
 
 Analysis The confusion surrounding the whereabouts of the wounded French reporter Edith Bouvier - and President Sarkozy's embarrassing admission that he had got it wrong in saying she had crossed safely into Lebanon - illustrate both the complications and the extreme dangers surrounding efforts to bring the trapped western journalists to safety. Necessarily, any attempt to extricate them has to be surrounded with secrecy, especially if it involves smuggling them across the Baba Amr battlefront and then the tense and dangerous terrain between Homs and the Lebanese border. From several accounts, the four journalists - Paul Conroy, Edith Bouvier, William Daniels and Javier Espinosa - came under shellfire as they were trying to escape, and the group got broken up. The one certain thing is that Paul Conroy managed to make it across the border, with the help of the activists guiding him. The Avaaz group, which played a role in the operation, said many activists died while escorting the journalists, who will clearly have their own dramatic story to tell. The whereabouts of the missing three journalists remains unclear, though some relatives and other sources believe they may still be trapped in Baba Amr under shellfire. 
 
 Reports on Tuesday said Homs had come under some of its heaviest bombardment yet, with the government sending in units of an elite armoured division into rebel-held districts. 
 
 President Sarkozy's statement on the campaign trail that Ms Bouvier had reached safety came after nearly 24 hours of confusion over the journalist's fate. He later withdrew the statement, describing the situation as unclear and complex. 
 
 "It has not been confirmed that she is in safety in Lebanon," he told journalists in Montpellier. "Communications with Homs are very difficult." 
 
 The BBC's Jim Muir in Beirut says confusion remains over Ms Bouvier's location. 
 
 Campaign group Avaaz said it had co-ordinated an operation to free the wounded journalists and two trapped colleagues, and some of the activists involved had died in the process. 
 
 Avaaz executive director Ricken Patel said the rescue group had been split in two by shelling after leaving Homs, and only Mr Conroy's group had been able to move forward. 
 
 Avaaz described the three other journalists - Ms Bouvier, Javier Espinosa from Spain and Frenchman William Daniels - as "unaccounted for". 
 
 Mr Conroy was apparently able to walk across the border into Lebanon during the night, but our correspondent adds that the more seriously wounded Ms Bouvier would have had to be carried on a stretcher. 
 
 Both journalists were hurt in the attack in which journalists Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik died. There has been no word on what has happened to their bodies. 
 
 Mr Conroy's brother Alan said the family still did not know where he was. 
 
 "When we've heard him on the phone or he turns up on the doorstep, then we'll be very happy," he said. "He's a very strong character anyway. He'll cope." 
 
 'War criminal' 
 
 In Washington, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said that President Bashar al-Assad fits the definition of a war criminal. 
 
 Campaign group Avaaz in Syria Says it co-ordinated rescue attempt of Paul Conroy, Edith Bouvier and two other journalists from Homs 
 
 Has set up a network of citizen journalists and smuggled in foreign journalists 
 
 Claims to have delivered more than $1.8m of medical equipment to the worst-hit areas 
 
 Has helped collect and verify information on the scale of the crackdown on dissent 
 
 She told a Senate hearing that an argument could be made for declaring the Syrian leader a war criminal. 
 
 Mrs Clinton added that such an action would complicate the chances of finding a solution to the violence - and tended to make it harder to persuade a leader to stand down. 
 
 As many as 125 people died across Syria on Monday, many of them in a single incident at a checkpoint in Homs, the activists' network the LCC said. 
 
 Sixty-five more were killed on Tuesday, it said. Death tolls remain very hard to verify as media access across the country is tightly restricted. 
 
 The emergency session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) discussed a confidential report delivered by a UN panel of experts that lists Syrian army officers and government officials who could be investigated for crimes against humanity. 
 
 French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has urged the 47 nations in the council to be prepared to submit a complaint against Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. 
 
 "The task of the council is to express the disgust of the entire world at the odious crimes that the Syrian state is committing against its people," he said. 
 
 But the meeting is unlikely to bring about any change from the government in Damascus which is currently fighting for its survival, says the BBC's Jim Muir, in Beirut. 
 
 It is more likely to put pressure on countries such as Russia and China, which have opposed any international action against Syria, he adds.
– At least 144 people were killed yesterday in the latest Syrian violence, including some 64 slaughtered in a "horrifying massacre" at a single checkpoint in Homs province, according to witnesses. But the government has no plans to end its attacks on citizens. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem vowed to "defend" his country. "We are not happy to see brothers killing each other," he said. "This is our country. But we will defend our sovereignty and independence," he told reporters. The scores killed at the checkpoint were attempting to flee shelling in the city of Homs. Security forces and thugs kidnapped the women among them, and killed the men, sources told CNN. They were either shot or stabbed to death. The killings occurred as Syrian officials announced that the nation's new draft constitution was overwhelmingly approved by voters, and the European Union imposed new sanctions. US officials dismiss the constitution vote "as absolutely cynical," said State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. What Basahr al-Assad has done "is put a piece of paper that he controls to a vote that he controls so that he can try and maintain control." In other Syrian news, the BBC earlier reported that French reporter Edith Bouvier refused to board a Red Cross vehicle that managed to enter besieged Baba Amr, and UK photographer Paul Conroy stayed behind in solidarity. But the BBC now reports that Conroy has indeed been smuggled out of the country; Bouvier's whereabouts are unknown.