Some 30 celebrities have petitioned the U.N. demanding they take action to protect civilians, notably Palestinian refugees, caught up in the Syria conflict as it entered its fourth year on Saturday.

Stars including Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Sting, Roger Waters and Tracey Emin were among those calling on the United Nations Security Council and presidents of the General Assembly to create safe spaces and local ceasefires to allow emergency supplies to reach besieged people.

Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri noted on Saturday that the government policy statement that was drafted on Friday does not grant one party or power authority over that of the state.

He said in a statement: “Several interpretations can be made over the policy statement, but one central truth is clear and that is there can be no return to the 'army-people-resistance' equation.”

The army blocked the dirt road at the Hekr al-Dahri bridge over the Kabir River on the northern border with Syria in Akkar, the state-run National News Agency reported on Saturday.

It was also said that the army deployed checkpoints in different areas of Akkar and organized patrols in several villages.

The U.N. and aid groups urged the West to open its borders to Syrian refugees and called for an end to the conflict, which entered its fourth year on Saturday.

U.N. refugee chief Antonio Guterres, speaking at a press conference attended by numerous organizations, called for "all borders to be open to Syrians and in particular to Syrian children."

Heavy clashes were underway Saturday inside the Syrian rebel bastion of Yabrud near the border with Lebanon, a Syrian military source said, a day after government troops entered the town.

Yabrud sits near key rebel supply lines stretching into Lebanon, and its fall would deal a major blow to the rebels as the war enters its fourth year.

President Michel Suleiman stressed that he will call for the resumption of the national dialogue after the government earns parliament's vote of confidence, while emphasizing the importance of the Baabda Declaration in protecting Lebanon, reported the Kuwaiti daily al-Anba on Saturday.

He told the daily: “Adhering to the Declaration is key to resolving disputes in Lebanon.”

Syria's civil war enters a fourth year Saturday, with at least 146,000 people dead, millions more homeless, cities and historical treasures in ruins, the economy devastated and no end in sight.

On March 15, 2011, just weeks after popular uprisings toppled dictators in Tunisia and Egypt, protests erupted in Syria's southern city of Daraa after teenagers were arrested over anti-regime graffiti.

French prosecutors on Friday charged two women over the disappearance of a 15-year-old girl who is believed to have traveled to Syria to fight alongside jihadist rebels.

The pair were charged by a Paris court with complicity in criminal association in relation to a terrorist undertaking, a judicial source told AFP.

Since his return to the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin has grown more powerful than ever before. The strongman, who has ruled Russia for the past 14 years, has muzzled his opponents, check-mated the West on Syria and is now on the verge of annexing Crimea.

On Friday, the Kremlin upped the ante further, hinting it could move forces beyond Ukraine's peninsula to protect his compatriots.

The United States expressed revulsion Friday at the prospect of Syrian President Bashar Assad running for re-election, three years into a crushing civil war triggered by an uprising against his family's lengthy rule.

"We've been clear that Assad has lost all legitimacy to lead his people and any sort of campaign that he might run would be offensive and disgusting, I think, after what he's done to his people over the last many, many months," State Department deputy spokeswoman Marie Harf said.