BEIRUT, Jan 28 (AFP): Ten rebels were killed in combat with government forces in Hasakeh, a majority-Kurdish city in northeast Syria, while fighting raged in a Damascus district on Monday, a watchdog said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the fighting in Hasakeh occurred at the Al-Ghazal roundabout late on Sunday, but gave no further details.

Hasakeh is the capital of a province of the same name that has seen fighting between a complex array of rival forces, including between rebels and the army, between Kurdish popular committees and Islamist rebels on the Turkish border, and between Kurdish militiamen and regime forces.