The European Union reiterated Sunday that President Basahar Assad must step aside to allow a political settlement after the Syrian leader called for a national dialogue in a much-awaited speech in Damascus.

A spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said in a short statement: "We will look carefully if there is anything new in the speech but we maintain our position that Assad has to step aside and allow for a political transition."

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday warned of "polarization" across the region as he led a low-key ceremony marking the anniversary of the founding of the country's armed forces.

Maliki said "regional competition" was negatively affecting Iraq, an apparent reference to the violence in Syria where mainly Sunni rebels are fighting President Bashar Assad's regime, and two weeks of rallies in Iraq's western Anbar province, which is mostly Sunni.

Iran's parliament on Sunday urged "judicial action" against police officers involved in the death in detention of a blogger last year, adding he may have died of "shock."

"The most likely cause of death could be shock, which, if proved, could have been caused by blows to sensitive parts of the body, or could have been due to excessive psychological pressure," media reported quoting a report read in the parliament.

Britain denounced President Bashar Assad's speech on Sunday calling for a conference of national dialogue to end the Syrian conflict as "beyond hypocritical," as Germany said the address offered "no new insights."

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Assad's first speech to the nation since June was full of "empty promises" and would "fool no-one".

The opposition Syrian National Coalition rejects a reconciliation plan outlined by President Bashar Assad in Damascus on Sunday, spokesman Walid al-Bunni told Agence France Presse by phone.

"We said at the founding of the National Coalition that we want a political solution, but ... there are now over 60,000 martyrs. The Syrians did not make all those sacrifices in order to bolster this tyrannical regime," he said.

Nearly 9,000 Syrians, mostly women and children, fled to Jordan over the past six days to escape the bloodshed in their homeland, a government spokesman told AFP on Sunday.

"Some 8,835 Syrians fled to the kingdom since January 1 this year," said Anmar Hmud, a government spokesman for Syrian refugee affairs.

A Yemeni court specializing in terrorism cases sentenced five Yemenis to between four and 10 years in prison Sunday on charges of membership in Al-Qaida and for plotting to carry out terrorist attacks.

Key defendant Mohammed Muawada was jailed for 10 years while three accomplices were given a 6-year prison sentence each and the fifth one was sentenced to four years in jail, according to the verdicts announced by judge Hilal Mahfal.

Syrian President Bashar Assad in a rare speech Sunday denounced the opposition as "slaves" of the West and called for a national dialogue conference to be followed by a referendum on a national charter and parliamentary elections.

Outlining a reconciliation plan aimed at resolving Syria's 21-month conflict which according to the U.N. has claimed more than 60,000 lives, Assad called on foreign powers to end their support for rebels seeking to topple his regime.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday said Israel would erect a new security fence along its armistice line with Syria in order to protect the Jewish state from "infiltrations and terror."

Speaking at the beginning of the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu noted that a new, fortified barrier along Israel's border with Egypt, replacing an older one, was nearly complete.

A Kuwaiti court on Sunday sentenced an opposition youth to two years in jail for writing tweets deemed offensive to the ruler of the oil-rich Gulf state, a rights activist said.

Rashed al-Enezi, who was in the courtroom to hear the sentence, was immediately arrested by police and taken to jail, the head of the independent Kuwait Society for Human Rights, Mohammad al-Humaidi, told AFP.