From the reports of fighting coming out of Syria on Monday, it's hard to believe the war-ravaged country was ever the subject of a peace agreement, as the architect of that failed plan renewed his call to limit civilan casualties in Geneva.

It was just last Thursday that U.N. mediator Kofi Annan finally acknowledged that his plan for steering the country out of conflict had failed. On Monday, Reuters reports, he issued a statement warning of civilians trapped in the fighting, and pleading with the fighters to allow U.N. military observers into the town of Haffeh, where Assad's forces reportedly attacked rebels with helicopters and tanks. 

On Monday, Syrian rebels briefly took over a Syrian Army missile base and threatened to fire at President Bashar al-Assad's palace, before government soldiers forced them out. The Syrian army renewed an assault on the rebel stronghold of Homs on Monday, activists told Reuters, shelling and firing missiles into the city in one of the biggest bombardments since Annan began trying to implement his peace plan in April. And starting on Friday, rebels carried out coordinated attacks in Damascus, which had largely escaped heavy violence in this conflict so far.

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Adam Martin