Syrians showed in elections this month that they support the government's policy of reform and a majority back the regime, President Bashar Assad said in an interview broadcast Wednesday.

The results of the May 7 legislative poll showed that the Syrian people "are until now supporting the policy of reform" and "support the institutions of the state", Assad told Russia's Rossia-24 state news channel.

Iran, the main regional ally of Syria, said on Wednesday that Damascus needs more time to make a U.N.-backed plan aimed at ending 15 months of violence work.

"More time should be given to the Syrian government in order to make (U.N.-Arab League envoy) Kofi Annan's plan a success," Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said, quoted by ISNA news agency.

An all-out army offensive against Al-Qaida in south Yemen raged into a fifth straight day on Wednesday with battles around the restive town of Loder leaving another 13 people dead, most of them jihadists, sources said.

Wednesday's fighting saw the army backed by local militiamen taking on Al-Qaida insurgents in an area surrounding Mount Yasuf, overlooking Loder in Abyan province, which until it was overrun on Tuesday had been an Al-Qaida stronghold, witnesses said.

Prominent Bahraini rights activist Nabil Rajab told a court on Wednesday that a charge that he tweeted insults against the government were "vindictive," as dozens of lawyers turned up to defend him.

"The charge against me is vindictive and is due to my rights activism," Rajab told a judge at Manama's Minor Criminal Court, insisting the decision to arrest and try him was political, according to witnesses.

Iran has called on its people to stage rallies after this week's Friday prayers to protest against what it described as a U.S. plan to annex Bahrain to Saudi Arabia.

The Islamic Propagation Coordination Council, which organizes state-backed protests, urged Iranians "to protest against the American plan to annex Bahrain to Saudi Arabia and express their anger against the lackey regimes of Al-Khalifa and Al-Saud."

A reshuffled Palestinian cabinet in the West Bank with seven new faces is to be sworn in on Wednesday, labour minister Ahmed Majdalani told Agence France Presse.

"The government will be sworn in at (President Mahmoud) Abbas's office at 6:00 pm (15:00 GMT)," he said.

Syria's rebels have seen an influx of arms including anti-tank weaponry for their fight against President Bashar Assad regime, in an effort coordinated with the help of the United States, a report said Wednesday.

Officials in President Barack Obama's administration insist it is not directly supplying the weapons or providing funding, with Gulf states paying for the new arms, the Washington Post said, citing U.S. and foreign officials.

Regime troops shot dead at least five people in a new assault on the flashpoint town of Khan Sheikhun and opened fire on a refugee camp in southern Syria on Wednesday, monitors said.

A child, another civilian and three armed militants were killed by machinegun fire in Khan Sheikhun, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Iran warned on Tuesday that Riyadh's plans to form a union with Manama would deepen the crisis in Bahrain, a day after Saudi Arabia told Tehran to keep out of its relations with the tiny Gulf kingdom.

"Any kind of foreign intervention or non-normative plans without respecting people's vote will only deepen the already existing wounds," foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said in a statement carried by Iranian media.

A convoy of U.N. truce observers came under bomb attack in a Syrian town on Tuesday during a funeral procession in which a monitoring group said regime forces "massacred" 20 people.

The incidents took place as Syria's anti-regime revolt entered a 15th month of relentless violence that has killed more than 12,000 people and amid growing fears that a U.N.-backed peace plan will fail.