Syria conflict: UN envoy meets Assad - Monday 24 December 2012

Syria conflict: UN envoy meets Assad - Monday 24 December 2012

• Lakhdar Brahimi holds talks with Assad in Damascus
• Seven killed in alleged gas attack in Homs
• Russians manning Syria's air defences 
• Official results in Egypt's referendum due on Tuesday

Summary

Welcome to Middle East Live.

Here's a roundup of the latest developments:

Syria

• The joint UN Arab League envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi has held talks in Damascus with President Bashar Assad. Brahimi told journalists after the meeting that he discussed the situation in Syria overall and gave his views on how to solve the crisis.

• Russian military advisers are manning some of Syria's more sophisticated air defences – something that would complicate any future US-led intervention, the Guardian has learned. The advisers have been deployed with new surface-to-air systems and upgrades of old systems, which Moscow has supplied to the Assad regime since the Syrian revolution broke out 21 months ago.

• Dozens of of people have been killed in an air strike on a bakery in Syria's central Hama province, activists claim. "There is no way to really know yet how many people were killed. When I got there, I could see piles of bodies all over the ground. There were women and children," said Samer al-Hamawi, an activist in the town of Halfaya, where the strike hit. 

Egypt

• Egypt is due to announce the official results of a referendum on a divisive draft constitution. Unofficial polling suggested more than 60% of voters said "yes" to the draft, which is endorsed by Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

•Egypt's opposition has called for an investigation into allegations of fraud in the vote. The National Salvation Front said the result had been secured by "fraud, violations and organisational shortcomings".

• Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has already congratulated Morsi ahead of the official result, Turkey's Today's Zaman reports. In a telephone call to Morsi on Sunday night he said he hoped the constitution would bring benefits to Egypt. Iran also welcomed the vote as a "a decisive step towards democracy". 

Updated at 9.59am GMT

10.28am GMT

Bread queue 'massacre'

Horrific video of the aftermath of the alleged air strike on a bread queue in Halfaya showed dozens of mutilated bodies [warning: very disturbing footage].

The BBC's Beirut-based reporter Jim Muir cast doubt on activists claims that the attack hit a bakery queue by pointing out that the bodies in the video were all of fighting-aged men. Speaking on BBC radio, he said that if it was a bread queue that had been hit more women and children would have been among the dead.

This may be true, but many of the photographs of bread queues released before the incident have shown such queues tend to be dominated by men especially when there has been fighting in the area.

Activists claim 94 people were killed in the incident in Halfaya. An unconfirmed update from opposition spokesman Ausama Monajed claimed women and children were among the dead.

Syrians gather outside a bakery in the Shaar neighbourhood of Aleppo earlier this month. Photograph: Javier Manzano/AFP/Getty Images

Syrian residents stand in line outside a bakery during heavy fighting between Free Syrian Army fighters and government forces in Aleppo on 3 December. Photograph: Narciso Contreras/AP

Updated at 10.29am GMT