More than 250 people have been killed and hundreds wounded in a new massacre committed by the Syrian forces in al-Tremsa in Hama on Thursday.

Activists at the Syrian Revolution Commission told reporters that scores of dead bodies were scattered in houses and in farms in al-Tremsa, while more than 150 dead bodies have been piled up in al-Tremsa mosque.

Activists said that helicopters have targeted the trucks carrying the humanitarian aid on their way to al-Tremsa, while the government troops shelled the village using tanks and missiles.

Syria's opposition has urged the UN Security Council to pass a binding resolution against Damascus following reports that regime forces massacred villagers in the central province of Hama.

Reports of the massacre in the village of Tremseh came after the Security Council envoys held their first talks on rival Russian and Western draft resolutions on Syria, with Moscow spurning calls for sanctions against President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The Syrian National Council (SNC), the main opposition bloc, said on Friday: "To stop this bloody madness which threatens the entity of Syria, as well as peace and the security in the region and in the world, requires an urgent and sharp resolution of the Security Council under Chapter VII (of the UN Charter) which protects the Syrian people."

Chapter VII allows for punitive measures against regimes considered a threat to the peace, including economic sanctions and military intervention.

"We expect members of the Security Council to assume total responsibility to protect defenceless Syrians against these shameful crimes," said the SNC, which added that the latest killings ranked "among the more infamous genocides of the Syrian regime."

Rights activists and monitors said Syrian troops with tanks and helicopters slaughtered more than 250 people on Thursday.

Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said that the bodies of 30 villagers had already been identified following the sustained attack.

Syria's Muslim Brotherhood, a bloc within the SNC, said UN-Arab League envoy to Syria Kofi Annan and Syrian allies Iran and Russia must shoulder the blame for the killings too.

"We don't consider the monster Bashar as being solely responsible for this heinous crime... but (also) Kofi Annan, the Russians and the Iranians and all countries which pretend to be guardians of peace and stability in the world but who remain silent," the Brotherhood said in a statement on Friday.

Source: Agencies