Syrian leader Ahmed Sharaa called for peace on Sunday after hundreds were killed in coastal areas in the worst communal violence since the fall of Bashar Assad.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based war monitor, said on Saturday more than 1,000 people had been killed in the two days of fighting in the Mediterranean coastal region in some of the worst violence for years in a 13-year-old civil conflict.
"We have to preserve national unity and domestic peace, we can live together," Sharaa, the interim president, said as clashes continued between forces linked to the new Islamist rulers and fighters from Assad's Alawite sect.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.