Iran on Thursday said a UN General Assembly vote condemning Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime over its "escalation" of the civil war will embolden "extremist groups" in Syria. "Not only will (the UN condemnation) not help the problem there, but it will also escalate the actions and crimes of extremist groups in Syria," Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Araqchi said in a statement carried by the Mehr news agency. The resolution on Wednesday was adopted by 107 countries in the 193-member assembly, down from 133 when the last vote was held in August.

More than 94,000 people have been killed in more than two years of conflict in Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a newly-revised toll on Tuesday. The watchdog group said it revised the toll -- just two days after it announced a tally of 82,257 dead -- after receiving new information from regime-controlled Alawite areas of the Sunni-majority country. "Based on this information, the number of martyrs and dead killed since the beginning of the Syrian revolution is more than 94,000," it said in a statement.

Twin car bombs killed at least 43 people and wounded 100 Saturday in a Turkish town near the Syrian border, in an attack Ankara blamed on pro-Damascus groups. The bombings were the deadliest in Turkey, a key supporter of the Syrian opposition, since the conflict started more than two years ago. Rescuers were hunting for possible survivors buried underneath the rubble of buildings destroyed by the blasts in Reyhanli, one of the main Turkish hubs for Syrian refugees and rebels.

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria's opposition coalition will meet in Istanbul on May 23 to decide whether to participate in a U.S. and Russian-sponsored conference to try to end the Syrian civil war, coalition officials said on Sunday.