Updated 11:30 a.m. ET: U.N. cultural agency UNESCO is set to condemn Syria at its executive board meeting on Wednesday but fall short of Western and Arab hopes of expelling it from its human rights committee, according to a draft resolution obtained by Reuters.

Also on Wednesday, a team of aid workers from the Syrian Arab Red Crescent entered the devastated Homs district of Baba Amr.  The team was accompanied by U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos, who recently arrived in the city.

"The Syrian Arab Red Crescent stayed inside Baba Amr for about 45 minutes. They found that most inhabitants had left Baba Amr to areas that have been already visited by the ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent in the past week," ICRC spokesman Hicham Hassan told Reuters in Geneva.

An ICRC aid convoy has been unable to enter Baba Amr since reaching Homs a day after rebel fighters fled.

The long delay in securing access for relief agencies trying to deliver supplies and evacuate the wounded has fuelled international concern about the fate of survivors in Baba Amr.

UNESCO board
The U.N. Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation's (UNESCO) executive board, which includes the United States, France and Russia, elected Syria to two panels in November, including one that judges human rights violations.

NYT: Across a murky river, Syrians flee to safety

A group of Western and Arab nations had sought the expulsion of Syria from the U.N. cultural agency's human rights committee, the latest international effort to isolate Damascus over its violent crackdown on domestic unrest.

The resolution submitted by countries including Saudi Arabia, the United States and the Britain condemns Damascus for "the continued widespread and systematic violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms by the Syrian authorities."

The resolution also requests for UNESCO's Director General to report on the matter in the future. It makes no mention of Syria's membership of the human rights committee.

Report: Syrian military hospitals torturing patients

A vote was pushed back to Thursday, a source said.

Diplomacy has yet to brake a conflict likely to have cost more than 10,000 lives: the United Nations says security forces have killed well over 7,500 people and Syria said in December that "terrorists" had killed more than 2,000 security personnel. 

Amos in Homs
Amos had wanted to visit Syria last week, but was denied access. The Syrian military drove armed rebels from the battered Baba Amr district on Thursday after a month-long siege and state media say civilians have begun returning there.

EPA / Salvatore di Nolfi

U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos accompanied a team of aid workers from the Syrian Arab Red Crescent who entered the devastated Homs district of Baba Amr on Wednesday.

In another effort to stop the violence, former U.N. chief Kofi Annan plans his first visit to Damascus as joint envoy of the United Nations and the Arab League on Saturday.

There was no information on what food or medical aid the Red Crescent workers were able to take with them into Baba Amr. The ICRC had not gained permission from Syrian authorities to enter the area since last Friday, raising fears about the fate of survivors in Baba Amr.

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Syrian tanks bombarded other opposition areas in Homs overnight, anti-Assad activists said, although an ICRC spokesman in Damascus said the city was quieter than before.

No independent witnesses have been allowed into the devastated Baba Amr district since rebels withdrew.

In the latest of several accounts of killings and other abuses, local activist Mohammed al-Homsi said troops and pro-Assad militiamen had stabbed to death seven males, including a 10-year-old, from one family on Tuesday. "Their bodies were dumped in farmland next to Baba Amr," he told Reuters.

Syria imposes severe media restrictions, making such reports hard to verify, although U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has voiced alarm at reports that Syrian government forces have executed, imprisoned and tortured people in Baba Amr.

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The Red Cross told Syria on Friday it was unacceptable that its aid convoy had been prevented from entering a battle-scarred district of Homs where the opposition said President Bashar Assad's army had committed a massacre.

Baba Amr became a symbol of resistance to Assad after government troops surrounded it with tanks and artillery and shelled it intensively for weeks, killing and wounding civilians cowering in its ruined buildings.

"It is unacceptable that people who have been in need of emergency assistance for weeks have still not received any help," ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said in a statement.

"We are staying in Homs tonight in the hope of entering Baba Amr in the very near future."

A convoy of trucks with food and other aid was preparing to enter the shattered district of Baba Amr, the International Committee of the Red Cross, or ICRC, said Friday.

The ICRC received a "green light" from Syrian authorities late Thursday, hours after rebels left the heavily bombarded area following a 26-day siege aimed at crushing a symbol of the revolt against President Assad.

Rebels withdrew on Thursday in a key moment in the year-old uprising against Assad's rule. An official at Syria's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates said the army had "cleansed Baba Amr from the foreign-backed armed groups of terrorists."

Activists said Syria's army was hunting down and killing insurgents who had stayed to cover their comrades' retreat, although the reports could not be verified. They said 10 young men were shot dead on Friday.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon made an impassioned plea on Friday for Damascus to grant immediate access for aid workers to besieged Syrian towns, describing the images of death coming out of the country as atrocious.

"The images which we have seen in Syria (are) atrocious," Ban told reporters. "It's totally unacceptable, intolerable. How as a human being can you bear ... this situation? That really troubles me. I'm deeply sad seeing what's happening."

In a rare show of unity with Western powers, Russia and China joined other U.N. Security Council members on Thursday in expressing "deep disappointment" at Syria's failure to allow the U.N. humanitarian aid chief Valerie Amos to visit the country, and urged that she be allowed in immediately.

Russia and China have twice vetoed council resolutions that would have condemned Syria for the crackdown and demanded that it halt the crackdown on anti-Assad demonstrators.

The United Nations says Syrian security forces have killed more than 7,500 civilians during the government crackdown on pro-democracy protesters.

"All violence must stop," said Ban. "I am really urging Syrian authorities to stop (the) violence and allow humanitarian access."

With government forces moving in, the U.N. human rights office voiced dismay over reports suggesting former rebel areas were being subjected to bloody reprisals.

Syrians flee into limbo in northern Lebanon

"We are alarmed at reports starting to come out of the Baba Amr district of Homs after it was taken over by government forces yesterday (Thursday)," U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville told a news briefing in Geneva.

"Although we are not, at this point, in a position to confirm any of those reports, we would like to remind the authorities of their responsibilities under international law.

UN demands immediate 'unhindered' humanitarian access to Syria

"It is essential," Colville added, "that there are no unlawful reprisals, no summary executions, no torture, no arbitrary detention. And the rights of those who are detained must be respected."

Britain's prime minister David Cameron told a press conference in Brussels that "the history of Homs is being written in the blood of its own people" and that the city "is a scene of medieval barbarity."

His concerns were echoed by French president Nicolas Sarkozy, who said France had closed its embassy in Damascus.

Snow delays convoy
ICRC spokesman Hicham Hassan said a joint ICRC and Syrian Arab Red Crescent team, carrying seven truckloads of food and other aid, that left Damascus on Friday morning had faced a weather delay.

"Snow is making the movement of the convoy slower, but we hope to be in Homs within the hour. Red Crescent volunteers and ambulances are waiting in Homs for the convoy to arrive and we are hoping to enter Baba Amr as soon as possible," he said.

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 The U.N. Security Council is deploring the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation in Syria and calling on authorities there to grant U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos "unhindered access," according to The Associated Press.

A statement -- the first on Syria to be approved by the council in seven months -- is significant because it requires the agreement of all 15 council members, including Russia and China, who last month vetoed two resolutions condemning the Syrian government's bloody crackdown and calling for President Bashar Assad to step down.

While a U.N. statement is not legally binding on Syria, it does reflect the growing concern of the council about the impact of the year-old conflict on Syria's civilian population.

Syrian rebels retreated Thursday from a neighborhood in Homs that they had held for months, saying they were running out of weapons and humanitarian conditions were catastrophic after almost four weeks of government bombardment.

Graphic: The siege of Homs

Within hours of the rebels' withdrawal, President Bashar Assad's government granted permission for the International Committee of the Red Cross to enter the besieged neighborhood of Baba Amr in Homs on Friday. Human rights workers have been appealing for access to Baba Amr for weeks.

"The ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent received today from the Syrian authorities the green light to enter Baba Amr tomorrow to bring in much-needed assistance including food and medical aid, and to carry out evacuation operations," spokesman Hicham Hassan told The Associated Press.

Earlier, rebels told journalists that a few fighters had remained behind in the shattered quarter to cover the "tactical withdrawal" of their comrades. The withdrawal appeared to be an agreement between the two sides in order to avoid a showdown, the BBC reported.

Syrian forces, which shelled Baba Amr earlier in the day despite world alarm at the plight of civilians trapped there, said they were in full control of the district, the BBC reported.

The head of the Free Syrian Army, Col. Riyad Assad, told the BBC that government troops had moved in and were combing the area. The Free Syrian Army is composed mainly of Syrian soldiers who have defected and volunteer civilians.

Images: The fear of carnage to come

A senior official in the FSA earlier told Reuters that rebels in Baba Amr were fending off more than 7,000 government troops. Opposition forces had promised to step up attacks elsewhere in Syria to try to relieve the pressure.

Reports from the city could not be verified immediately due to tight government restrictions on media operations in Syria.

Also on Thursday, Kuwait's parliament said it would support the rebel Free Syrian Army, and called on the Kuwaiti government to cut ties with Assad.

The parliament, which has limited legislative powers, called for Assad to be prosecuted for crimes against his people.

'Whatever the cost'
The 4th Armored Division, which was leading the assault on Homs, is commanded by Maher Assad, the president's younger brother, who has won a reputation for ruthlessness during the past year of revolt against the government.

A Lebanese official close to Damascus said Assad's government was determined to regain control of Homs, Syria's third city, which straddles the main north-south highway.

"They want to take it, whatever happens, without restraint, whatever the cost," the official told Reuters, asking not to be named.

He said defeat for the rebels in Homs, a city of 1 million people, would leave the opposition without any major stronghold in Syria, easing the crisis for Assad, who remained confident he could survive.

Smugglers take 'path of death' to supply Syria revolt

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told members of Congress on Tuesday that Assad could be considered a war criminal.

The U.N. estimates that more than 7,500 people have been killed since the anti-Assad struggle started in March 2011, when protesters inspired by successful Arab Spring uprisings against dictators in Tunisia and Egypt took to the streets in Syria.

Syria's government said in December that "armed terrorists" had killed more than 2,000 soldiers and police during the unrest.

Journalists escape to Lebanon
On Thursday, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said wounded French freelance journalist Edith Bouvier had arrived in Lebanon from Syria along with French photographer William Daniels.

Bouvier's family confirmed the news of her arrival in Lebanon to French TV channel France24.

Sarkozy, in Brussels for a European summit, told reporters that Bouvier would be flown home to France in a government plane. The flight could happen as soon as Thursday evening if doctors agreed, he said.

"Edith Bouvier and William Daniels are safely in Lebanon and will very shortly be under the protection of our embassy in Beirut," he said.

Bouvier's femur was shattered during heavy shelling of Homs's rebel-held Baba Amr district, which killed veteran Sunday Times war correspondent Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik last week.

Meanwhile, Spanish reporter Javier Espinosa, one of several Western journalists trapped in Baba Amr for a week, crossed to Lebanon on Wednesday, an activist said, following the escape on Tuesday of wounded British photographer Paul Conroy.

Thirteen Syrians were killed while aiding Conroy's escape, the activist group Avaaz said.

The Local Coordination Committees, a human rights monitoring group, said Bouvier had previously refused to leave Baba Amr without the Syrians who were wounded by shelling while attempting to help her escape, and she has called on the French ambassador for help.

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Gianluigi Guercia / AFP - Getty Images

A Free Syria Army member sits guard at a gate during the funeral of a man who was killed by shrapnel in Qusayr, 9 miles from Homs on Tuesday.

Heavy fighting broke out on Wednesday near the main rebel stronghold of Baba Amr in the city of Homs when Syrian troops began a ground assault, opposition sources told Reuters.

"The army is trying to go in with infantry from the direction of al-Bassel football field and fierce confrontations with automatic rifles and heavy machine guns are taking place there," activist Mohammad al-Homsi told the news service from Homs.

He said the military had shelled the area heavily on Tuesday and overnight before the ground attack started.

The reports of a ground assault came as the United Nations put the death toll in the 11-month uprising against authoritarian President Bashar Assad at well over 7,500. Activists reported more than 250 dead in the past two days alone — mostly from government shelling in Homs and Hama province.

Clinton: Syria's Assad could be labeled a war criminal

Tunisia's president — the first since the country's own Arab Spring uprising toppled his predecessor — offered the Syrian leader asylum as part of a negotiated peace, an offer Assad will almost surely refuse.

A Syrian diplomat reportedly stormed out of an emergency U.N. meeting amid renewed calls for a cease-fire to deliver humanitarian aid. A top human rights official told The Associated Press a U.N. panel's report concluded that members of the Damascus regime were responsible for "crimes against humanity."

Rebel stronghold shelled as Syria vote result looms

In shift, China backs aid
In a possible significant change of tact, China backed international efforts to send humanitarian aid to Syria, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said, after Western powers proposed a United Nations resolution authorizing humanitarian aid.

It was not clear whether Yang's remarks mean China will consider the proposed new U.N. Security Council resolution. China is one of the five permanent members of the Council which have the power to veto such resolutions.

"The pressing task now is for all sides to cease violence in the Syrian conflict, and to launch as soon as possible inclusive political dialogue and together deliberate on a reform plan," Yang told Elaraby, who has previously said Beijing's veto lost it diplomatic credit in the Arab world.

'I think I will die,' man in Syria's besieged city of Homs says — then the line goes dead

"The international community should create conditions for this, and extend humanitarian aid to Syria," added Yang.

China is trying to win back diplomatic ground after its widely condemned handling of the Syrian crisis.

Western powers said the U.N. Security Council would work on a draft resolution about extending help to stricken parts of Syria, and France urged Russia and China not to veto it, as they have previous drafts.

Yang made the comments in a phone call late on Tuesday with the head of the Arab League, Nabil Elaraby, the official Xinhua news service reported on Wednesday.

The bloodshed in Syria, where government forces have been bombarding neighborhoods held by opposition forces, has turned into a broader test setting Western powers against China and Russia over how the world should respond to civil turmoil.

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Updated 3:28 p.m. ET: The Red Cross said on Saturday it was still unable to evacuate civilians from the embattled Baba Amro district of Homs, as the Syrian military took its bombardment of the rebel-held area into a fourth week.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said there were "no concrete results" from its negotiations with both Syrian authorities and opposition fighters.

"Unfortunately we will not be able to enter Baba Amro today. We continue our negotiations, hoping that tomorrow (Sunday) we will able to enter Baba Amro to carry out our life-saving operations," said spokesman Hisham Hassan.

Opposition activists in Homs complained they saw no help coming from an international "Friends of Syria" conference in Tunis on Friday and said the world had abandoned them to be killed by security forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.

"They (foreign leaders) are still giving opportunities to this man who is killing us and has already killed thousands of people," said Nadir Husseini.

Despite the bloodshed, Assad is staging a referendum on Sunday on a new constitution that he says will pave the way for a multi-party parliamentary election within three months.

Security forces killed 61 people on Saturday, including 19 in Homs, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Sources close to the ICRC negotiations said talks failed due to confusion amid heavy shelling and bad communications with fighters and state forces. Much of Homs, and other opposition areas in Syria, are in a communications blackout with phone and internet connections cut off.

Damascus said it condemned all statements at the Tunis conference, which it dubbed "the enemies of Syria meeting."

"Syria deplores all voices calling for financing the armed groups which could lead to support for terrorism and hurt the interests of the Syrian people," Syria TV reported.

State news agency SANA reported the funerals of 21 members of the security forces killed by "armed terrorist groups" in Homs, Deraa, Idlib and areas near Damascus.

At the conference in Tunis, Western and Gulf Arab nations mounted the biggest push in weeks to end the violence, calling on Assad to cease all violence and allow access for humanitarian supplies.

Saudi Arabia's finance minister called the idea of arming the opposition an "excellent idea".

But activists in Homs, a city of over 800,000, said the Tunisia meeting was a failure that brought no relief from the bombardment.

"I don't understand what they are waiting for. Do they need to see half the people of Syria finished off first?" said a doctor speaking anonymously from the restive town of Zabadani.

"The people of Zabadani resent what happened in Tunis. We need them to arm the revolution."

The ICRC said its local partner, the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, had been able to carry out two evacuations in areas of Homs other than Baba Amro on Saturday.

But Husseini said people in Baba Amro were suspicious of the the Syrian Arab Red Crescent and did not want to work with a group "under the control of the regime."

Rebels plead for weapons to make their vision of post-Assad Syria happen

The ICRC said the Red Crescent was independent and its members were risking their lives to help people affected by the violence.

A video uploaded by activists showed smoke curling up from buildings hit by rocketfire in Homs' Khalidiya district. Nearby, crowds carried six bodies wrapped in white shrouds, shouting "We swear to God we will not be silent about our martyrs."

"We have hundreds of wounded people crammed into houses. People die from blood loss. We just aren't capable of treating everyone," said Husseini.

Russia and China, which did not attend the Tunisia meeting, oppose Security Council action and there is little appetite for military intervention in Syria.

The opposition has called for a boycott of the referendum, deriding Assad's reform pledges and demanding that he step down.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu questioned how the vote could take place in the midst of so much violence.

"On one hand you say you are holding a referendum and on the other you are attacking with tank fire on civilian areas. You still think the people will go to a referendum the next day in the same city?" he asked at a news conference in Istanbul.

Davutoglu, whose country has turned strongly against its former friend since the Syrian revolt began in March, said Syria should accept an Arab League plan that calls on Assad to quit.

In Baba Amro, activist Omar in Homs said the referendum meant nothing to the opposition and those hit by unrest.

"No one is going to vote. This was a constitution made to Bashar's tastes and meanwhile we are getting shelled and killed. More than 40 people were killed today and you want us to vote in a referendum? ... No one is going to vote."

U.S. President Barack Obama said on Friday it was time to stop the killing of Syrians by their own government.

"All of us seeing the terrible pictures coming out of Syria and Homs recently recognize it is absolutely imperative for the international community to rally in sending a clear message to President Assad that it is time for a transition."

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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