BEIRUT: Diplomatic wrangling at the Security Council has emboldened the Syrian campaign against opposition strongholds, the U.N. human rights chief charged Monday, as security forces continued their bombardment on the central city of Homs.

“The failure of the Security Council to agree on firm collective action appears to have emboldened the Syrian government to launch an all-out assault in an effort to crush dissent with overwhelming force,” the High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay told the U.N. General Assembly.

“I am particularly appalled by the ongoing onslaught on Homs,” Pillay said. “According to credible accounts, the Syrian army has shelled densely populated neighborhoods of Homs in what appears to be an indiscriminate attack on civilian areas.”

Russia and China on Feb. 4 vetoed a European-Arab draft resolution condemning the crackdown and endorsing an Arab League plan for the Syrian leader to step aside.

But the Arab League proposal – rejected outright by Damascus – to send foreign peacekeepers drew a lackluster international response Monday.

Russia, Assad’s close ally and main arms supplier, said it could not support a peacekeeping mission unless both sides ceased the violence first. In Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia would not support the peacekeeping plan unless there was a halt to violence by both government forces and their armed opponents. He suggested the latter would be tough to achieve.

“The tragedy is that the armed groups that are confronting the forces of the regime are not subordinate to anyone and are not under control,” Lavrov said.

“A halt to the violence must be universal,” he said.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe meanwhile warned that any foreign military action in Syria would only aggravate the situation.

“We think that today any external intervention of a military nature would only worsen the situation, all the more given that there will not be a decision by the Security Council, which is the only body able to authorize military intervention,” Juppe said in the southwestern city of Bordeaux, in response to questions about the possibility of French peacekeepers being deployed in Syria.

But despite the apparent stalling, Beirut-based Naharnet reported media sources in Saudi Arabia as saying that the kingdom will take part in an Arab peacekeeping force in Syria, and claiming that Saudi tanks had already started heading toward the Jordanian border.

China backed what it termed the Arab League’s “mediation” but offered no clear sign of support for the deployment of peacekeepers.

“Relevant moves by the United Nations should be conducive toward lessening tension in Syria ... rather than complicating things,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin said.

Syrian forces renewed a 10-day assault on Homs Monday. Activists there told The Daily Star that the city was surrounded by tanks.

Shelling eased slightly after mortar rounds and tank fire earlier pounded the rebellious Bab Amro neighborhood. Government troops also concentrated their fire on Al-Waer in the west, which borders the Military College, a main assembly point for tanks and government troops, opposition campaigners said.

“We heard that the Free Syrian Army has started responding by attacking roadblocks being manned by Shabbiha,” an activist who called himself Hasan told Reuters.

The Free Syrian Army, led by military defectors, has taken the central role in armed opposition to the government. Accounts of action on the ground are difficult to verify because Syria restricts access by journalists.

One activist claiming to be close to Bab Amro said a rocket fired at a vehicle in the center of Bab Amro killed all those inside.

“We have not been able to identify them, they are too badly burned,” he said, adding that he did not know why the car had been targeted.

Activist group, the Local Coordinating Committees, said 23 people were killed Sunday, adding to a toll of more than 300 since the assault on Homs, strategically located on the highway between the capital Damascus and second city Aleppo, began on Feb. 3. Electricity and communication lines were cut throughout the day.

Many people have reportedly fled the city, while the International Committee of the Red Cross told Reuters that Syrians living in crisis-hit areas are now struggling to find even basic foodstuffs.

“The situation has been increasingly violent and it hasn’t been easy for people to do anything. The streets are empty, people can’t go anywhere to buy food. There is even a problem getting bread, “ the ICRC’s Saleh Dabbakeh told Reuters by telephone.

The United States and Europe are reluctant to get dragged in militarily, fearing that given Syria’s position in the Middle East’s religious, ethnic and political fault-lines, this would be more risky and complicated than the NATO-led air support that helped Libyan rebels oust Moammar Gadhafi last year.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said any peacekeeping troops should come from non-Western countries.