Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has announced the United States and Turkey will study a range of new measures to help the Syrian opposition, including a possible no-fly zone. Clinton’s remarks are the closest Washington has come to suggesting direct military action in Syria to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Hillary Clinton: “The planning, what the minister and I agreed to today was to have very intensive operational planning. We have been closely coordinating over the course of this conflict, but now we need to get into the real details of such operational planning, and it needs to be across both of our governments. Certainly our two ministries are coordinating much of it, but our intelligence services, our military have very important responsibilities and roles to play.”

The United Nations humanitarian chief, Valerie Amos, has announced she will travel to Syria and Lebanon this week to discuss ways of increasing aid to civilians caught up in the Syrian conflict.

Adrian Edwards: “UNHCR’s offices in Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan and Iraq are all reporting increases this week in the number of refugees from Syria. Our data, which primarily reflects the number of people who have registered or are in the process of being registered, shows a total population of 146,667 people as of yesterday evening. In several countries we know there to be substantial refugee numbers, but these people have not yet registered.”