Iran, North Korea and Syria blocked adoption of a U.N. treaty that would regulate the multibillion-dollar international arms trade for the first time, saying it fails to ban sales to terrorists, but other countries refused to let the treaty die.

The treaty's adoption required agreement by all 193 U.N. member states, but some countries said Thursday they would ask Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to bring the final draft before the General Assembly for adoption by vote as soon as possible. Observers said that could be as soon as Tuesday.

Russia said Thursday it will strongly oppose any bid to give Syria's U.N. seat to the rebel coalition fighting President Bashar Assad.

Russia's U.N. envoy Vitaly Churkin said recognizing the Syrian National Council would "undercut the standing of the U.N.."

The U.N. refugee agency sounded the alarm Thursday over reports that Turkey deported Syrians after clashes in a camp where they had sought refuge, but Ankara rejected claims they were forced back to the war-ravaged country.

On Wednesday, police fired tear gas and water cannons to disperse Syrians protesting after a fire in the camp -- which houses some 25,000 refugees -- killed a child and injured three other people, Turkey's Anatolia news agency reported.

Umm Ahmed and Umm Ibrahim watch over simmering casseroles containing dozens of kilos of rice and noodle soup, as they help prepare meals for a growing number of poverty-stricken residents of Aleppo, once Syria's commercial hub.

The two young women work for the Multaqa Harair Suriya, or association of free Syrian women, which is tasked with preparing and distributing meals in several districts of the country's largest city in the north.

A Syrian MP from the southern province of Daraa bordering Jordan on Thursday painted a bleak picture of the situation there, saying that insurgents have seized part of the main highway to Damascus.

"Syria is no longer going through a crisis. It is plunged in total war. Terrorism has spread in Syria and so has chaos. This is reality, and all Syrians know it," Walid al-Zohbi told parliament in a session broadcast live on state television.

A mortar attack on Damascus University killed at least 12 students on Thursday, state television reported, blaming rebels who have stepped up attacks in the heart of the Syrian capital.

"The number of students killed in the mortar attack on the architecture faculty in Damascus University has risen to 12," said the broadcaster, blaming "terrorists" for the attack, using the regime term for insurgents.

Fresh battles raged Thursday in flashpoint districts on the outskirts of Damascus, a monitoring group said, while army tanks pounded insurgent enclaves near the Syrian capital.

"Fierce battles broke out at dawn on Thursday pitting rebels against troops in the (northeastern) district of Qaboon, while tanks shelled the neighborhood's edges," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Syria has not yet agreed to give the "unfettered access" demanded by the United Nations for an inquiry into the alleged use of chemical weapons in the country's conflict, diplomats said Wednesday.

The United Nations wants the team to start work as early as next week but has still not reached an agreement with President Bashar Assad's government on the extent of the investigation, diplomats and U.N. officials said.

Austria said Wednesday it does not plan on withdrawing any forces from the U.N. peacekeeping mission on the Golan Heights, despite rising concern over troop safety in conflict-torn Syria.

"At the moment there are no plans" for any reduction in personnel, a defense ministry spokeswoman told Agence France Presse.

Leaders from emerging powers on Wednesday expressed their opposition to threat of military action against Tehran, amid U.S. and Israeli warnings they will not tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran.

"We are concerned about threats of military action as well as unilateral sanctions," leaders from Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa said at the end of a two-day summit.