Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: A Regime Losing Control?

2025 GMT: Syria state news agency SANA is highlighting pro-regime rallies throughout the country today, including marches in Damascus, Baniyas, "stressing rejection of all forms of foreign interference in Syria's affairs".

The demonstrators unfurled large Syrian flags, sang the national anthem, and chanted in support of President Assad's reform programme.

2010 GMT: Footage from Morocco's largest city Casablanca of today's pro-reform demonstration:

2000 GMT: Activists are claiming, with the support of video, that "hundreds" have been injured --- two from live fire, eleven from stone throwing, and the rest from gas inhalation --- in Hodeidah in Yemen during demonstrations in the "Day of Rage" against President Saleh's 33rd anniversary in power.

Hodeidah tonight:

A a youth protest this evening in the capital Sana'a:

And in Taiz:

1950 GMT: Protest tonight in the Midan section of the Syrian capital Damascus, calling for the overthrow of the Assad regime:

1920 GMT: Syrian troops have arrested prominent writer Ali Abdallah.

"Ten soldiers entered my father's house around 9:00 a.m. in the Damascus suburb of Qatana and took him. He just had heart surgery three weeks ago," Abdullah's son Mohammad told Reuters from exile in Washington.

Abdallah, a 61-year-old secular thinker, was released in May after spending four years in prison because of his involvement in the Damascus Declaration, a pro-democracy group of intellectuals and opposition figures, and his criticism of President Bashar al-Assad's alliance with the Iranian regime.

1910 GMT: Tunisian police have fired in the air and used tear gas to disperse a crowd of about 200 people who set fire to a police station in the Intilaka district, just outside the capital Tunis.

Protesters were angered by an incident on Friday when police fired tear gas at a Tunis mosque to break up a demonstration. They chanted "Allahu Akbar (God is great)", "You attacked Islam!", and "We are not afraid of your police!"

1900 GMT: Claimed footage of demonstrations tonight in Idlib Province in northwest Syria:

1730 GMT: Confusion over the story of Hosni Mubarak's coma (see 1800 GMT). The original source appears to be his wife Suzanne, but the head of the hospital in Sharm El-Sheikh has denied the report. Another medical source says Mubarak has been slipping in and out of a coma, but his condition is "stable".

1715 GMT: Egyptian State TV, quoting Hosni Mubarak's lawyer, says the former President is in a coma in a hospital in the resort of Sharm El-Sheikh.

Mubarak has been hospitalised since April, when he suffered a heart attack during questioning over alleged fraud and the killing of protesters during the uprising which ousted him on 11 February.

He was due to go on trial on 3 August.

1555 GMT: Women in Dhamar in Yemen protest against President Saleh on the 33rd anniversary of his accession to power:

1550 GMT: Insurgents claim they have moved into the oil town of Brega in north-central Libya in "close fighting" with regime troops. Spokesman Mohammed Zawi said, "Some small groups have made it inside, but we do not control the whole (town) yet."

The battle around and in the town, briefly held by the opposition this spring, is now in its fourth day.

Meanwhile, CNN's Ivan Watson reports from a pro-regime rally in Zawiya, west of Tripoli:

1545 GMT: As we reported earlier this week, Bahrain's main opposition party Al-Wefaq is on the verge of withdrawing from the regime's "national dialogue". Spokesman Khalil al-Marzouq confirmed, "The Wefaq board decided to pull out of the so-called National Consensus Dialogue and submitted its decision to the Wefaq Shura council (upper council) for ratification. The Wefaq team will not attend today's (dialogue) session."

1530 GMT: Egyptian Prime Minister Essam Sharaf, will replace the Ministers of Finance, Industry, and Foreign Affairs, following last week's departure of the Deputy Prime Minister, Yehia el-Gamal.

Foreign Minister Mohamed El-Orabi had been appointed less than three weeks ago but said he was stepping down to "honour the will of the people". Protesters have criticised El-Orabi as a long-time supporter of former President Hosni Mubarak.

The veteran economist Hazem Beblawi will become Minister of Finance, and Ali al-Selmy, a leader of the Wafd Party has been asked to oversee social reforms. Al-Selmy already faces a challenge because of Wafd's initial lukewarm support for the January uprising and Selmy's record as Deputy President of Cairo University, where he was accused of using security forces to suppress teachers' demands.

Sharaf's changes are dependent on approval from Egypt's Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, protesters are demanding the replacement of the Minister of Interior, Mansour el-Essawy, and the Minister of Justice, Mohamed al-Guindy.

1510 GMT: Anti-regime protesters march in Taiz in Yemen today, the 33rd anniversary of President Saleh's accession to power:

1500 GMT: Saudi media report that two Omani women were briefly detained for driving in Saudi Arabia.

The two women, arrested between Riyadh and the western city of Taef, were released after signing a commitment not to re-offend.

Saudi women have been purusing a Women2Drive campaign. One of the leading figures, Manal al-Sharif, was arrested after she posted a YouTube video of herself behind the wheel.

1450 GMT: Al-Watan, the newspaper owned by President Assad's ally Rami Makhlouf, has claimed the Syrian army is ready to occupy Al-Bukamal, on the border with Iraq: "The situation in Al-Bukamal is explosive, so the army is preparing to intervene...because the authorities fear an armed revolt in this border town where (insurgents) can easily find logistical and political support."

A civilian was killed in the area on Saturday when security forces opened fire on an anti-regime demonstration (see 1155 GMT). State news agency SANA claimed "armed terrorist gangs who stormed a government building and seized the weapons stored there", killing three security personnel and kidnapping two.

Al-Watan also said the "situation was back to normal" in the central city of Hama, the flashpoint of challenge to the regime in recent weeks: "The efforts the new governor of Hama has made with civic leaders have borne fruit. The state of civil disobedience which lasted 13 days is over. With the help of residents, officials have started to remove the roadblocks erected on major thoroughfares."

1445 GMT: Two contrasting clips of the conflict in Syria today:

Demonstrators in the Darraya suburb of Damascus rally...

...while the Syrian military deploys in Zabadani, north of the capital (see 1200 GMT):

1200 GMT: Residents say Syrian forces have moved into Zabadani, 40 kilometres (25 miles) north of Damascus and near the Lebanese border, detaining dozens of people.

Witnesses say troops rounded up people indiscriminately and set up checkpoints. They also claim phone services and electricity have been cut off.

1155 GMT: Footage of military forces in the Khalidiya section of Homs in Syria:

The funeral procession today of a slain protester, Musa Ahmad Al-Musa, in Al-Bukamal in the northeast:

1145 GMT: David Kirkpatrick writes in The New York Times:

The military council governing Egypt is moving to lay down ground rules for a new constitution that would protect and potentially expand its own authority indefinitely, possibly circumscribing the power of future elected officials.

The military announced Tuesday that it planned to adopt a “declaration of basic principles” to govern the drafting of a constitution, and liberals here initially welcomed the move as a concession to their demand for a Bill of Rights-style guarantee of civil liberties that would limit the potential repercussions of an Islamist victory at the polls.

But legal experts enlisted by the military to write the declaration say that it will spell out the armed forces’ role in the civilian government, potentially shielding the defense budget from public or parliamentary scrutiny and protecting the military’s vast economic interests. Proposals under consideration would give the military a broad mandate to intercede in Egyptian politics to protect national unity or the secular character of the state.

0855 GMT: One of a series of protests in the Syrian capital Damascus on Saturday --- this one is in the Barzeh section:

0845 GMT: A pro-reform march on Saturday in Salé in northwestern Morocco on Saturday --- activists are hoping protesters will turn out today in cities throughout the country:

0620 GMT: With the resurgence of protest in Tahrir Square in Cairo, there has been a matching flurry of perspectives. From the inside, Sharif Abdel Kouddous declares, "Egypt's revolution is far from over," while from the outside, Robert Fisk is pessimistic: "The advantage of the revolution, it seems, was that it had no leaders, no one to arrest. But its disadvantage, too, was that it had no leaders, no one to take responsibility for the revolution once it was over.2

By far, the most intricate assessment --- with self-reflection, criticism, and then the hope of Tahrir as a microcosm of Egyptian efforts to rebuild a nation --- comes from activist Mahmoud Salem ("Sandmonkey"). We have featured it in a separate entry.

Meanwhile, Associated Press reports:

A member of Egypt’s ruling military council on Saturday briefly visited a protest camp in a central Cairo square, but left after protesters, some holding up shoes in anger, booed him off a stage.

Maj. Gen. Tarek el-Mahdi had come to Tahrir Squar to persuade a dozen demonstrators to end a hunger strike they began several days ago, but was forced to cut short his visit because of the heckling.

0500 GMT: Gulf News, based in the United Arab Emirates, is in no doubt:

No government can reinforce its legitimacy by killing its population on a regular basis. For four months protesters have been marching every week in Syria, and the security forces have killed hundreds of people. The president's two speeches have been ineffective, and he has refused to address the need for serious reform. The government in Syria is losing control of its country, and it refuses to recognise that fundamental change is required.

More than 350 Syrian expatriates, across the political spectrum, want to establish this. On Saturday, they met in Istanbul to elect a 25-member National Salvaition Council to press their demands.

Still, the regime has enough "control" that it could disrupt an opposition gathering, supposed to coincide with the expatriate meeting. A drawn-out contest still appears to be the most likely scenario. It could also --- sign of control of concession ---release 28 intellectuals and artists who had been calling for demonstrations.

And so to the ritual of overnight protests. Saqba in Damascus:

Deir Ez Zor in the northeast:

Lattakia on the coast:

And a funeral yesterday in Homs for a protester killed on Friday: