Hizbullah and the AMAL movement on Monday said they would continue to stand by Syria and Iran against "international conspiracies" and "threats", as global pressure mounts on the two countries.

"The current events in Syria are clearly an international conspiracy against Syria's support for Arab and Islamic resistance movements in the region," they said in a joint statement.

Syria's Foreign Minister Walid Muallem on Sunday dismissed as "wishful thinking" a warning by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that his country risked descending into civil war.

"When Mrs. Clinton says the opposition is well-armed ... it is, as they say in English, 'wishful thinking'," Muallem told a news conference in Damascus.

The United States said Wednesday that the use of violence by the Syrian opposition plays into the Syrian "regime's hands," adding it did not condone violent acts by either side.

State Department deputy spokesman Mark Toner was reacting to reports that Syrian army defectors had attacked a Syrian military intelligence base on Wednesday in one of the most daring raids in eight months of unrest.

European Union nations tightened the noose on Syria on Monday, slapping new sanctions on President Bashar al-Assad's regime and urging U.N. action to protect civilians after eight months of bloodshed.

Foreign ministers from the 27-nation bloc blacklisted a further 18 Syrians, mostly members of the military, bringing to 74 the members of Assad's inner circle hit in past months by an EU assets freeze and travel ban.

British Foreign Minister William Hague called Monday for "ever-increasing" international pressure, rather than military intervention, to end the violent repression in Syria.

"I don't think the answer to (the repression) now or subsequently would be a military intervention from outside," Hague told reporters in Strasbourg after a meeting of Council of Europe ministers.

A senior U.S. official will on Monday launch a three-country campaign to firm up sanctions against Syria and to tackle transnational organized crime, the U.S. Treasury Department said.

Assistant Secretary Daniel Glaser will travel to Beirut, Moscow and Amman for a week-long visit.

Members of the U.N. Human Rights Council said Friday they seek to "shine a spotlight" on violations in Syria and will press ahead with investigations of the regime whether or not its monitors are allowed into the country.

A U.N. human rights fact-finding mission was barred entry to the violence-plagued state in August, and a subsequent U.N.-backed commission of inquiry has also been refused access, with its members instead traveling to border areas in neighboring countries to monitor abuses from there.

Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri congratulated on Friday the Lebanese people and Muslims in general on the occasion of the Eid al-Adha, stressing the importance of solidarity with the Arab people who are striving for freedom.

He warned, in a statement, against attempts to avoid the implementation of the Arab initiative aimed at ending the Syrian crisis.

Following is a list of successive promises made by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad towards introducing reforms and ending the opposition protest movement.

March 2011: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, in his first public statement since the start of protests on March 15, says Syria is facing a "conspiracy."

The Arab League plan accepted by Damascus to end the bloodshed in Syria is a life raft for President Bashar al-Assad's regime as it sets no real deadlines and stipulates no implementation mechanisms, analysts say.

"The Arab countries are trying to save one of their pillars from falling, and it's not clear that they seek to save the Syrian people," said London-based analyst Abdul Wahab Badrkhan.