Western journalists Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik have been killed in the Syrian city of Homs when shells hit the building they were staying in, according to opposition activists.
Marie Colvin was an American Sunday Times reporter, and Remi Ochlik, a French photographer.
Several other people were reportedly killed when the shell hit the makeshift media centre in the Baba Amr area.
Opposition-held districts have been under siege by security forces for more than two weeks, leaving hundreds dead.
Activists said more than 40 people died on Tuesday, including Rami al-Sayed, a man who broadcast a live video stream from Homs used by world media.
Rami al-Sayed was fatally wounded by shrapnel during the shelling of Baba Amr. His brother posted a video of his body in a makeshift hospital.
The Red Cross has called on the government and rebels to agree to a daily ceasefire, to allow medical supplies to reach the worst affected areas and get civilians out, but there is no sign yet of this being agreed.
Marie Colvin, Sunday Times reporter
Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik were reportedly staying in a house in Baba Amr that was being used by activists as a media centre when it was hit by a shell on Wednesday morning.
Rockets were also said to have hit the building’s garden when people tried to flee afterwards.
At least two other foreign journalists were wounded, activists said.
One was named as British freelance photographer Paul Conroy, who was working with Marie Colvin, and Edith Bouvier of the French newspaper, Le Figaro. Edith Bouvier was said to be in a serious condition.
French photojournalist Remi Ochlik
In Paris, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said the deaths would be investigated.
“It’s another demonstration of the degradation of the situation in Syria and of a repression that is more and more intolerable,” he told reporters.
“I hope that on Friday at the <<Friends of Syria>> meeting in Tunis we will be able to move towards a peaceful solution of the situation.”
UK Prime Minister David Cameron told parliament: “This is a desperately sad reminder of the risks that journalists take to inform the world of what is happening, and the dreadful events in Syria.”
The editor of the Sunday Times, John Witherow, said the newspaper was doing what it could to recover Marie Colvin’s body and get Paul Conroy to safety.
“Marie was an extraordinary figure in the life of the Sunday Times, driven by a passion to cover wars in the belief that what she did mattered,” a statement said. “She believed profoundly that reporting could curtail the excesses of brutal regimes and make the international community take notice.”
There was no immediate comment from Remi Ochlik’s agency, IP3 Press.
Remi Ochlik, 28, had reported from Haiti and covered many of the recent uprisings in the Arab world.
Marie Colvin, in her 50s, had been a foreign correspondent for the Sunday Times for two decades, and had reported from several war zones. She lost the sight in one eye in Sri Lanka in 2001 after being hit by shrapnel.
On Tuesday, Marie Colvin told the BBC the bombardment of Baba Amr by Syrian government artillery and tanks had been “unrelenting”.
“I watched a little baby die today, absolutely horrific, a two year old – found the shrapnel had gone into the left chest and the doctor said: <<I can’t do anything>>,and his little tummy just kept heaving until he died. That is happening over and over and over.”
“There are 28,000 people in Baba Amr,” she added. “The Syrians will not let them out and are shelling all the civilian areas.”
“There is Free Syrian Army here. They’re very, very lightly armed. People are terrified they will leave.”
Western journalists have mostly been barred from Syria since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began last March.
But increasingly, they have risked entering the country undercover, helped by networks of activists, to report from flashpoints.
Last month, the French television journalist, Gilles Jacquier, was killed in Homs while visiting the city on a government-organized trip.
Anthony Shadid, of the New York Times, died of an apparent asthma attack in Syria last week.
In the northern province of Idlib, reports put Tuesday’s death toll there at more than 50.
New videos posted online by activists there suggest opponents of President Assad were the victims of summary executions.
One shows residents of the village of Abdita looking at a row of about a dozen dead bodies laid out on the ground.
There was similar footage from the nearby village of Balshun showing bodies scattered around in an open field.
Some had their hands bound and had died from a bullet wound to the head.
State media said security forces had been operating in the area, pursuing “armed terrorist gangs” and that a number had been killed.
In another video from Idlib, about 500 Syrian troops appear to announce their defection from the army to join the Free Syrian Army. The footage cannot be independently confirmed.
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At least 25 people have been killed in two bomb attacks targeting security forces compounds in Syria’s second city of Aleppo, state media report.
According to state television, the death toll included both civilians and members of the security forces and blamed “armed terrorist gangs” for the blasts.
There are conflicting reports about whether the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA) was behind the attacks.
A spokesman appeared to confirm that it was, but another blamed the government.
Col Malik al-Kurdi, the FSA’s deputy leader, said it had been monitoring the activity of security forces personnel and members of the pro-government Shabiha militia inside a Military Intelligence compound and a riot police base in Aleppo on Friday morning.
“When they were gathering in a square to go to the mosques and repress demonstrations, two groups from the FSA targeted the two buildings with small arms and rocket-propelled grenade fire,” he said.
“After violent clashes, there was an explosion inside the Military Intelligence building. At first we didn’t know what it was, but we think it was the regime trying to stop the operation of the FSA,” he added.
Another FSA spokesman, Col Mahir Nouaimi, told AFP: “This criminal regime is killing our children in Homs and carrying out bomb attacks in Aleppo to steer attention away from what it is doing in Homs.”
At least 25 people have been killed in two bomb attacks targeting security forces compounds in Syria's second city of Aleppo
Opposition activists also said the government was responsible, accusing it of trying to discredit the uprising. Suspicious activity by security personnel had been noticed shortly before the blasts, they added.
Syrian state TV broadcast images showing at least five corpses and mangled body parts.
A weeping TV reporter said the bomb targeting an intelligence building went off near a park, where people had gathered for breakfast and children had been playing.
Some children were killed in the blast, he said, holding up an inline-skate.
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A French TV reporter, who has been killed in the Syrian city of Homs among other eight today, is the first Western journalist to die in the country’s current unrest.
Gilles Jacquier was on a government-authorized trip to the city, the France 2 channel said.
Syrian TV said Gilles Jacquier was among eight killed. A colleague said that minutes earlier they had interviewed some people at a pro-government gathering.
Opposition groups say 15 people died around the country on Wednesday, including three in Homs.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has called for full clarification of what happened.
“We vigorously condemn this odious act,” Alain Juppe said in a statement.
The Syrian authorities have severely restricted access to foreign journalists since the unrest began last March.
More than 5,000 people have been killed, the UN says. The government says 2,000 security personnel have died combating “armed gangs and terrorists”.
Observers arrived in Syria in December to monitor an Arab League peace plan, but the killing has continued.
Arab League said on Wednesday it was delaying sending more monitors after an attack on an observer team earlier in the week, Reuters news agency reported.
Eleven observers were slightly injured in the attack, in the port city of Latakia.
Gilles Jacquier is described as a veteran award-winning journalist who covered conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo, and between Israel and the Palestinians
Gilles Jacquier, 43, was part of a group of 15 foreign journalists being shown around a part of Homs and speaking to locals.
One of his colleagues said they were escorted by soldiers and police, and were in a part of the flashpoint city where street life was relatively normal with some shops open.
A grenade fell close to them minutes after they had spoken to some young people and they fled into a nearby building. More grenades hit the building causing casualties.
“There was smoke everywhere, people started screaming and yelling. There was complete chaos,” he said.
Gilles Jacquier was behind him when he went into the building, but he saw him lying dead a few minutes later, he added.
At least one other European journalist was wounded, reports say. Dutch officials and media said a Dutch journalist was hurt.
The area of the attack is inhabited by members of the Alawite sect and therefore considered to be mainly pro-government. No opposition supporters have given an account of the incident.
Gilles Jacquier is described as a veteran award-winning journalist who covered conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo, and between Israel and the Palestinians.
His mission in Syria was to make a documentary film on the protests.
The incident came as Arab League observers continued their mission aimed at monitoring a peace plan proposed by the league.
Earlier on Wednesday, a former member of the mission called it a “farce” and described the situation there as a humanitarian disaster.
Anwar Malek told al-Jazeera TV that he had resigned because of what he had witnessed in Syria, including war crimes committed by security forces.
He said the government had “fabricated” most of what the monitors had seen to stop the Arab League taking action.
The UN Security Council has been told that an estimated 400 people had been killed in Syria since the mission arrived in late December – an average of almost 40 deaths a day.
The US permanent representative to the UN, Susan Rice, said the figure showed Syria’s government had accelerated its killing of demonstrators, rather than using the opportunity to end the violence.
Meanwhile, President Bashar al-Assad made a surprise appearance at an open air rally by thousands of his supporters in Damascus.
Bashar al-Assad said he wanted to show his love for the Syrian people.
His wife, Asmaa, and his children were also briefly shown in the live broadcast. There had been speculation that they might have left Syria.
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