DAMASCUS: A spate of bombings across Damascus killed at least 83 people in the deadliest day for the capital since Syria's war erupted, a watchdog said Friday, as the opposition discussed a plan for peace talks with the regime.
Thursday's biggest bombing, which both the regime and its opponents blamed on "terrorists", killed 61 people and left a trail of destruction in the city centre, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The attack, in Mazraa district, was carried out by a suicide bomber who detonated his explosives-laden car near the entrance of the Baath party's main offices, said the Britain-based monitor.
Gruesome images of charred bodies next to mangled vehicles were shown on state television, which said children were among the casualties in the explosion near a school.
The blast wounded more than 200 people in a wide radius, including Nayef Hawatmeh, the head of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which said he was hit by flying glass in his office 500 metres (yards) away.
Russian news agencies reported the windows of Moscow's embassy were blown out, although no staff was hurt.
Another 22 people were killed in an apparently coordinated triple bombing targeting security headquarters in the northern Damascus district of Barzeh on Thursday, including 19 members of the forces, said the Observatory.
Attacks have increasingly targeted government or security buildings in Damascus in recent months, many of them claimed by the jihadist Al-Nusra Front which Washington has designated as a "terrorist" organisation.
The attacks were condemned by both the regime of President Bashar al-Assad and the umbrella opposition National Coalition, as well as the United States, Russia and UN chief Ban Ki-moon.
There was no still claim of responsibility for the Mazraa blast.
The Syrian foreign ministry alleged the bombing was "carried out by armed terrorist groups linked to Al-Qaeda that receive financial and logistic help from abroad", using government terminology for rebels.
The opposition also denounced the bombers as "terrorists".
"Any acts targeting civilians with murder or human rights violations are criminal acts that must be condemned, regardless of the perpetrator or the justification," said the National Coalition.
Elsewhere, 38 people were killed Thursday in Daraa, birthplace of the revolt in the country's south, including 18 in an air raid on a medical centre, said the Observatory.
Also in Daraa, six women and a child all from the same family were killed in an explosion at Tsil, and 10 more civilians died in army shelling of Jassem town.
In the northwestern province of Idlib, where sectarian strife has been rising, 40 Shiites kidnapped by an armed group and 300 Sunnis abducted in reprisals last week were released after mediation talks between families.
The majority of the Syrian population fighting the Assad regime are Sunni Muslims, while the president and his clan belong to the Alawite branch of Shiite Islam.
The attacks added urgency to the National Coalition meeting in Cairo, where discussions will continue later on Friday focused on an offer by its chief to talk directly with the regime.
Coalition chairman Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib has offered to talk to regime officials without "blood on their hands" -- an initiative welcomed by the Arab League and the United States as well as Assad allies Iran and Russia.
But the Syrian National Council, a key part of the Coalition, has rejected any talks until Assad quits, and the regime says it will negotiate only without preconditions.
At the United Nations, Russia accused US diplomats of blocking a Security Council condemnation of the Mazraa attack. Other diplomats said however that Russia had refused to include language criticising Assad.
The UN says at least 70,000 people have been killed in the conflict which was sparked by a bloody regime crackdown on Arab Spring-inspired protests that broke out in March 2011.
-AFP/fl
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Spate of blasts killed 83 in Damascus' deadliest day
