DAMASCUS // At least eight mourners were shot dead on Saturday as Syrians swarmed the streets to bury scores of demonstrators killed in massive protests and world leaders denounced the bloodshed.
Activists said the death toll from Friday's nationwide protests could reach 100 and expected fresh protests to form after the funerals.
Friday's deaths signalled no let-up from President Bashar al-Assad, whose forces used live ammunition and tear gas against demonstrators nationwide, witnesses and activists told AFP.
The bloodshed erupted as tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets for "Good Friday" protests to test long sought-after freedoms a day after Assad scrapped decades of draconian emergency rule.
The Syrian Revolution 2011, a motor behind the protests, marked the tone Saturday by posting on its main Facebook page a black banner with the word "Mourning" in English and Arabic.
It came as tens of thousands of mourners packed buses and headed on Saturday for the southern town of Ezreh for the funerals of 18 people killed the previous day, a rights activist told AFP by telephone.
Another activist later said "12 martyrs were buried in Ezreh" and that two men - Yasser Nseirat and Jamal Qanbar -- who were part of the funeral cortege heading for the town were shot dead by security forces.
Other activists spoke of five mourners killed in Ezreh and outside a hospital in Daraa, with the toll expected to rise.
"More than 150 buses left from Daraa and neighbouring villages to attend the funerals of 18 martyrs killed Friday in Ezreh," in Daraa province, an activist requesting anonymity said.
Daraa has been an epicentre of protests against the regime of Assad, who also scrapped the feared state security court on Thursday and signed a decree "to regulate" peaceful protests in the autocratic country.
Snipers also pinned down mourners in the northern Damascus suburb of Douma, killing at least three people on Saturday, a witness and a human rights activist there told AFP.
They opened fire from roof-tops as mourners marched from a local mosque to a cemetery, the sources said, adding that tens of thousands of people took part in the procession.
A group called the Committee of Martyrs of 15 March Revolution issued a list of 82 names of people killed on Friday, but said the toll from the "massacre" could reach 100 as it tried to confirm more deaths.
Amnesty International, citing Syrian activists, said at least 75 people were killed on Friday when the "government launched its deadliest crackdown yet on demonstrators" seeking reform.
Friday's toll compared with killings on March 23 in the southern town of Daraa, when activists said 100 people died, Amnesty said
The largest number of people were killed in Ezreh outside Daraa and activists expected Saturday's funerals to be followed by a "huge rally against the regime." Angry funerals were also expected elsewhere in the country.
Officially, Syria has blamed "armed gangs" for Friday's bloodshed and state-run SANA news agency said security forces intervened using only tear gas and water cannons to prevent clashes between protesters and passers-by.
Eight people were killed on Friday in Ezreh and 20 others wounded "including security forces in an attack by criminal gangs," SANA said, adding that two policemen had died in Damascus and the central city of Homs.
The violent crackdown drew an international outcry.
Russia, Italy and Greece added their voices to the chorus of condemnation that rang out from Washington, Paris, London, Brussels and from UN headquarters in New York.
US President Barack Obama blasted Syria's "outrageous" use of violence, accusing Assad's regime of seeking Iran's aid in the brutal crackdown on the pro-democracy movement that erupted in Damascus on March 15.
"Instead of listening to their own people, President Assad is blaming outsiders while seeking Iranian assistance in repressing Syria's citizens through the same brutal tactics that have been used by his Iranian allies."
But a senior official in Damascus, quoted on SANA, refuted the charges, saying Obama's condemnation was "not based on an objective vision of the reality on the ground."
UN chief Ban Ki-moon said Assad's government must "respect international human rights" and called for an independent probe into the killings, as France urged Syria to launch a "political dialogue without delay."
Russia, the first of Syria's allies to speak out, urged Damascus to accelerate "broad-scale political, social and economic reforms," saying Moscow views Damascus as its "friend."
Thousands of protesters chanting "freedom, freedom," and calling for the fall of the regime swarmed cities across Syria on Friday from Qamishli in the northeast to Daraa, witnesses said.
Protesters have said the decrees issued on Thursday were insufficient, insisting on the release of political prisoners and dissolution of Syria's security apparatus.