Syrian planes launch airstrikes at border with Lebanon

Syrian warplanes staged airstrikes on the eastern Lebanese town of Arshal on the border with Syria, a local Lebanese official said on Friday.

"Syrian planes launched several raids on the town," Arsal municipal chief Ali al-Hojeiri told Anadolu Agency.

According to al-Hojeiri, casualties were reported in the Syrian raids.

Scores of Syrian rebels have taken refuge in the border area between Syria and Lebanon since Syrian government forces seized control of the towns of Qalamoun and Yabroud in northern Syria.

Syrian regime violence kills 45, say activists

Meanwhile on Thursday, at least 45 people, including five children and two women, were killed during operations across Syria allegedly by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, according to opposition activists. 

The London-based Syrian Network for Human Rights, which tracks civilian and opposition casualties, said air and land operations by Assad killed 10 in Hama, eight each in Idlib and Aleppo, five each in Homs, Daraa and the suburbs of the capital Damascus, three in Deir ez-Zor, and one in Quneitra.

The Syrian government's official news agency SANA claimed Syrian troops "neutralized" a large number of armed groups.

Syrian refugee crisis threatens whole region, says UN

Regional security is at risk if the international community does not tackle the Syrian refugee crisis, the United Nations warned on Thursday.

Antonio Guterres, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said the UN is aiming to raise $3.74 billion from member states to help protect vulnerable refugees in Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and Egypt.

“The international community simply cannot afford to let this growing and increasingly protracted population of refugees fall through the cracks,” Guterres said. “Nor can we fail to support the countries who generously host them.”

The UN estimates at least 2.9 million Syrian refugees are registered across the region. This figure is growing at a rate of 100,000 a month, according to the refugee agency. An increasing number of women and children among them are facing “violence, exploitation and abuse.”

The UN has repeated its concerns that Syrian refugees also face reduced food rations, raising the possibility of widespread malnutrition.

Due to poor hygiene conditions and a lack of access to clean water, Syrian families may also be at risk of diarrhea, typhoid, polio and other water-borne and contagious disease, the UN added. 

Syria has been gripped by almost constant fighting since the Syrian government launched a violent crackdown in response to anti-government protests in March 2011, triggering a conflict, which has spiraled into a civil war.

The UN has stopped updating its death toll for the country due to difficulties in verifying casualties. At least 100,000 deaths were recorded in the last count in July 2013.