"Security forces and armed men are firing machine guns indiscriminately at the village," a witness said.

"The gunfire against Baida is intense like the rain. At least one person was injured," another witness told AFP.

The army kept a stranglehold on the coastal town of Banias, 280 kilometres (174 miles) north of Damascus, where residents said they faced a bread shortage.

"Security forces and the army continue to assault Banias and we know what they are preparing for us," said Anas al-Shuhri, one of the leaders of anti-regime protesters.

"There is a shortage of bread in the city, electricity is cut and the majority of phone lines are too," he added.

Abdelbasset, an electrician, told AFP the situation was "extremely bad".

"The army was redeployed outside the city and the security forces and shabbiha (regime agents) conducted a number of arrests. The town is dead, shops are closed," he said.

"Banias is surrounded by tanks, no one can get in or out. It is like a prison," said Yasser, a shopkeeper.

"We cannot get bread anymore in Banias. Bread supplies were brought from (the city of) Tartus but that is not enough. The petrol stations are also closed," he added.

Yasser said: "Security forces were responsible for killing soldiers in Banias because they had refused to attack the city," an account that differed sharply from the official version of events.

Preacher Sheikh Mohammed said: "Several families evacuated women and children (to the outskirts of the town), because we are in the Ras Al-Nabee neighbourhood which was targetted by gunfire from Al-Quz neighbourhood.

"The bakers of the town do not have enough bread," he added.

The army has encircled Banias since Sunday, when regime agents opened fired on residents, particularly those in mosques, killing four people and wounding 17, according to witnesses.

And in Ain Arab, a village in northern Syria, 600 Kurds held a one-hour peaceful protest calling for reforms and the release of political prisoners, said the head of the Rased Kurdish human rights group, Radif Mustapha.

The official SANA news agency had said nine soldiers, including two officers were killed on Sunday when their patrol was ambushed outside Banias.

Leading Syrian human rights groups denounced Sunday's attack, calling it a "despicable" act and urged the authorities to launch an investigation and punish those responsible.

"The government must fully assume its responsibilities towards the people and stop the spiral of violence," said a statement signed by several groups, including the Syrian League for the Defence of Human Rights and the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Meanwhile, human rights lawyer Khalil Maatouk reported the arrest on Tuesday of the head of the banned communist party, the latest opposition figure detained in a crackdown on nationwide protests.

Ghiyath Oyun al-Sood, secretary general of the Democratic People's Party was snatched while shopping near his home in the suburb of Sahnaya, south of Damascus, the lawyer said.

Another member of the outlawed communist party, Georges Sabra, was arrested on Sunday in Damascus, as well as Ahmad Maatouk of the also banned Socialist Democratic Union party, rights activist Abdel Karim Rihawi said Monday.

Security services also arrested on Monday prominent pro-reform writer and journalist Fayez Sara, 61, who is also member of the so-called "Damascus Declaration" opposition group that has been demanding reforms.

Faced with unrelenting protests and a rising death toll, Syrian authorities have adopted a sharper tone in recent days, blaming the violence on "trouble makers" trying to sow discord.

State media on Tuesday slammed "those sowing trouble, disorder and discord when Syria has already begun to address the problems and pave the road for change and reform".

Syrian students on Monday staged a rally, rare for Damascus, to express solidarity with protesters who were killed in a bloody weekend crackdown that left at least 30 civilians dead.

Protests erupted in Syria on March 15 calling for the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, who has been in power since 2000, to introduce sweeping political reforms.

burs/hkb/al