Hundreds of people were killed in Syria over four days after violent clashes between the army and loyalists of the deposed president Bashar al-Assad swept its western coastal region.

A monitoring group says 973 civilians have been killed in revenge attacks against the Alawite sect since Thursday.

A Syrian security source said the pace of fighting had slowed around Latakia, Jabla and Baniyas, while forces searched surrounding mountainous areas where an estimated 5,000 pro-Assad insurgents were hiding.

The scenes of elation following Monday night's declaration came in sharp contrast to the grim scenes in coastal communities wracked by days of clashes.

Abdi, by contrast, came to leadership via associations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), an organization that Turkey and many Western countries consider a terrorist group.Therefore, depending on how one views these organizations,

The Kurdish-led and U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which controls much of Syria's oil-rich northeast, signed a deal with the Damascus government on Monday to join Syria's new state institutions,