Red Cross: Aid Convoy Blocked By Syria Troops Red Cross To Head Into Shattered Homs

The Red Cross has said an aid convoy is being blocked from a ravaged district of Homs, amid reports a rocket attack has killed five children in the conflict-torn Syrian city.
Seven trucks carrying supplies have been waiting to enter the area of Baba Amr, which has suffered severe damage in four weeks of deadly bombardment.
The trucks are carrying food, medicines, blankets, baby milk and other equipment, which aid workers hope to deliver to some of the 4,000 residents trapped by fighting.
The president of the Red Cross has said the convoy is being prevented from entering the area by government forces, but there are hopes it will gain access in the "very near future".
Earlier the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 12 people - including five children - had died in a blast in the middle of a demonstration, as the mostly rebel-held city was subjected to further shelling and heavy gunfire from troops loyal to the regime.
Meanwhile, magistrates in Paris have opened a murder probe into an attack on a makeshift media centre in Homs last week, in which Sunday Times reporter Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik were killed.
And the international community is continuing to round on the government of President Bashar al Assad, with the UN Security Council calling on Syria to allow "immediate" humanitarian access to protest cities.
The call was supported by Russia and China, which have previously vetoed two resolutions on the conflict that has claimed thousands of lives in nearly a year.
Speaking at a news conference at the close of a European Union summit, David Cameron described the situation in Homs as "a scene of medieval barbarity", with residents under constant shelling and lacking water, food and medicine.
He called on Syrians who were "butchering" Syrians to turn their backs on the "criminal" Damascus regime as the EU issued a strong new call for the perpetrators of the violence to be brought to book.
Referring to the war crimes trial of late Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, the Prime Minister said: "We will make sure, as we did in Serbia, that there is a day of reckoning for those who are responsible.
"So I have a clear message for those in authority in Syria: turn your back on this criminal regime or face justice for the blood that is on your hands."
However, Russia's Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, criticised the West for backing Syrian opposition fighters against the government, saying it has fuelled the conflict.
Syrian forces have overrun Baba Amr following a rebel retreat, potentially marking a turning point in Mr Assad's bid to crush an increasingly armed uprising.
As rebel fighters pulled back on Thursday, the Syrian National Council (SNC) opposition group warned of a "massacre" in Baba Amr.
The SNC, citing "confusion" on the ground in Syria, said in Paris that it would provide leadership to an outgunned and fragmented force, and control the flow of arms to fighters.
An all-out ground assault in Homs, led by Mr Assad's younger brother, Maher, began early on Wednesday.
Rebels "have pulled out tactically" from Baba Amr in order to protect the remaining civilians", said Colonel Riyadh al Asaad, the leader of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is made up mostly of deserters.
A Syrian security official said in Damascus that the army was in now total command of the Homs neighbourhood, where hundreds are said to have been killed in recent weeks.
The FSA was formed in mid-2011 in response to the crackdown by Mr Assad's forces on anti-regime protesters, and now boasts up to 40,000 armed fighters, although the numbers are impossible to verify.
The SNC has urged the international community to act to protect residents, claiming the Fourth Armoured Division is conducting "barbaric operations against civilians".
French journalist Edith Bouvier, who sustained serious leg wounds in the February 22 attack on the Homs media centre, and photographer William Daniels - trapped for days in Homs - have made it out of Syria.
France has announced it is closing its embassy in Damascus, mirroring similar moves by Britain and the US.
Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, said at the EU summit in Brussels: "What is going on is scandalous, there are more than 8,000 dead, hundreds of children, and the city of Homs faces the risk of being wiped off the map."