BEIRUT (AP) — The Syrian government has agreed to allow humanitarian assistance into three beleaguered villages following reports of deaths from malnutrition in that part of the country, a U.N. official said Thursday.

Meanwhile, the aid group Doctors Without Borders said 23 patients have died of starvation at an MSF-supported health center in one of the three villages since Dec. 1 — including six infants under 1 years of age and five adults over the age of 60.

A statement from Yacoub El Hillo, U.N.'s Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Syria, said aid will begin entering the villages in the coming days.

Two of the villages in question are the adjacent Shiite villages of Foua and Kfarya in the country's north, which have been besieged by anti-government militants for more than a year. The third is the village of Madaya near the border with Lebanon, which has been under siege by government forces since early July.

"The UN welcomes today's approval from the government of Syria to access Madaya, Foua and Kfarya and is preparing to deliver humanitarian assistance in the coming days," said El Hillo.

Activists have said that several people have died over the past weeks in both areas because of malnutrition. There are currently some 30,000 people in the two Shiite villages and an even higher number in Madaya.

"Almost 42,000 people remaining in Madaya are at risk of further hunger and starvation," El Hillo warned.

El Hillo said the U.N. is particularly concerned about the plight of nearly 400,000 people besieged by parties to the conflict in areas including the eastern city of Deir el-Zour as well as the Damascus suburbs known as eastern Ghoua.

In the meantime, Syrian President Bashar Assad's government has repeatedly denied U.N. requests to deliver aid to specific areas.

"In the last year, only 10 percent of all requests for U.N. inter-agency convoys to hard-to-reach and besieged areas were approved and delivered," the statement said.

He added that up to 4.5 million people in Syria live in hard-to-reach areas, including nearly 400,000 people in 15 besieged locations who do not have access to the life-saving aid they urgently need.

The conflict that began in March 2011 has killed more than 250,000 people and wounded more than a million. The crisis has also displaces half of Syria's pre-war 23 million people.

From Brussels, Doctors Without Borders also called for an immediate delivery of lifesaving medicine and medical evacuations, in addition to food supplies to Madaya, where it reported the 23 deaths from starvation.

After the last, single food delivery in October, the siege of the village had tightened into a complete stranglehold, MSF said.

"Madaya is now effectively an open-air prison for an estimated 20,000 people, including infants, children and elderly," said Brice de le Vingne, MSF director of operations.

"This is a clear example of the consequences of using siege as a military strategy," de le Vingne added.

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Associated Press writer Cara Anna contributed to this report from the United Nations.

Israel's defense ministry in late December added a compound in the West Bank to the jurisdiction of the Gush Etzion regional council, near Jerusalem.

State Department John Kirby said Friday that "continued settlement activity and expansion raises honest questions about Israel's long-term intentions and will only make achieving a two state solution much more difficult." He added that the United States remains "deeply concerned" about the move, "which effectively creates a new settlement on 10 acres in the West Bank."

The Palestinians claim the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem, as parts of their future state. They consider all Israeli construction there to be illegal — a position that is backed by the international community. Israel says settlements along with other core issues like security should be agreed upon in peace talks.

Negotiations collapsed in 2014, in part over the issue of settlements.

The compound at Gush Etzion is located south of a junction that has been scene to multiple attacks by Palestinians against civilians and soldiers over the past three and a half months.

Hagit Ofran of the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now said a settler group bought the compound legally from a church in Sweden. She said it was not clear when people would move in.

"Now the compound is part of the municipality, so it is official," she said, adding that since it no does not belong to any specific existing settlement, her group is calling it "a new settlement."

The move came amid near-daily Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers that killed 21 people mostly in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming assaults. At least 134 Palestinians died by Israeli fire, including 93 said by Israel to be attackers. The rest were killed in clashes with troops.

Israel says the bloodshed is fueled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement. Palestinians say it stems from frustration over lack of hope in obtaining statehood.

Dubai (AFP) - Shiite Muslim protesters in eastern Saudi Arabia called Friday for the "death" of the Sunni-majority kingdom's ruling Al-Saud family at a rally to honour executed Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr, a witness said.

The demonstration capped a week of unrest in Nimr's hometown of Awamiya and uncertainty in the surrounding Shiite-dominated region of Qatif, after Nimr's execution on Saturday.

"Death to the Saud family," protesters shouted, raising their arms in the air, according to the witness.

"Fall, fall, Al-Saud", they added.

Pictures of the protest showed what appeared to be hundreds of people, many of them clad in black.

They held black flags and pictures of the executed sheikh, who was also honoured at a protest in Qatif on Friday night.

"The march finished safely," a witness said.

Nimr was a driving force behind protests that began in 2011 among the kingdom's minority Shiite community.

Those protests developed into a call for equality in the Sunni-dominated kingdom, where Shiites complain of marginalisation.

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Saudi Shiite women hold signs bearing a portrait of prominent Shiite Muslim cleric Nimr al-Nimr duri …

Nimr and three other Shiites were among 47 people convicted of terrorism and executed, provoking anger among Shiites and concern in Western nations.

Shiites protested in several Muslim countries and attacked Saudi diplomatic missions in the kingdom's regional rival, Iran.

Saudi Arabia and some of its allies cut diplomatic ties with Iran in reaction, triggering a diplomatic crisis and raising sectarian tensions in the region.

Around 1,000 demonstrators marched through Tehran on Friday, chanting "death to Al-Saud," while in the Pakistani capital 1,500 people rallied against Nimr's execution.

Eastern Saudi residents said there had been protests this week in Awamiya, a Gulf coast town of about 30,000 which has been the scene of repeated incidents since 2011.

- 'People are angry' -

Shiites called Nimr a peaceful activist, and an Awamiya resident said his death could lead to more aggression on the streets.

"The situation completely changed," he told AFP after seeing protesters blockade a street with a truck on Wednesday night.

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Saudi Shiite women react during a protest on January 8, 2016 in the eastern coastal city of Qatif (A …

Demonstrators also burned tires and garbage in the streets, while gunfire and explosions occurred regularly during the week, another resident of the Eastern region said of Awamiya.

"Last night was quiet compared with the beginning of the week," he told AFP Friday.

He said "activist boys" in groups of about five were behind the street unrest, which is opposed by the broader community.

A brother of Nimr also rejected the street blockades, for fear of violence.

"We don't need even one drop of blood", Jaffar al-Nimr told AFP.

But he added: "In Qatif, most of the people are angry."

The Nimr family received thousands of people who expressed their condolences over a three-day period this week, Jaffar al-Nimr said.

Early Friday, a man told police he was kidnapped at gunpoint in the Awamiya area, beaten and photographed, the official Saudi Press Agency said.

"His vehicle was shot at after he was released," it said, calling the incident a "terrorist" crime.

Last Sunday night in Awamiya gunmen killed a civilian and wounded a child when they opened fire on Saudi police, SPA reported earlier.

Police on Tuesday said armed "troublemakers" torched a bus in Qatif but there were no injuries.

"Everyone's now really afraid," a third resident told AFP, adding that activists who normally comment online are remaining silent.

"People don't know what will happen."

Since late 2014, Saudi Shiites have been targeted by suicide bombings and shootings claimed by Sunni extremists of the Islamic State group, who consider them heretics. About 40 Shiites have been killed.

Saudi security forces have also been targeted in attacks claimed by IS, whose leader has purportedly called Saudi rulers "apostate tyrants".

Diplomats said the mass execution sent a clear message that the kingdom will not tolerate extremism.

Nimr and three others were the only Shiites among the 47 put to death, who included Sunnis convicted of involvement in Al-Qaeda attacks that killed Saudis and foreigners in the kingdom about 12 years ago.

Associated Press Videos
Raw: North Koreans Rally Supporting Nuclear Test

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea warned of war as South Korea on Saturday continued blasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda across the rivals' tense border in retaliation for the North's purported fourth nuclear test.

North Korean propaganda is filled with threats of violence, but the country is also extremely sensitive to criticism of its authoritarian leadership, which Seoul resumed in its cross-border broadcasts on Friday for the first time in nearly five months. Pyongyang says the broadcasts are tantamount to an act of war. When South Korea briefly resumed propaganda broadcasts in August after an 11-year break, Seoul says the two Koreas exchanged artillery fire.

Speaking to a massive crowd at Pyongyang's Kim Il Sung Square, a top ruling party official said the broadcasts, along with talks between Washington and Seoul on the possibility of deploying in the South advanced U.S. warplanes capable of delivering nuclear bombs, have pushed the Korean Peninsula "toward the brink of war."

Pyongyang's rivals are "jealous" of the North's successful hydrogen bomb test, Workers' Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam said in comments broadcast on state TV late Friday.

South Korean troops, near about 10 sites where loudspeakers started blaring propaganda Friday, were on the highest alert, but have yet to detect any unusual movement from the North Korean military along the border, an official from Seoul's Defense Ministry, who refused to be named, citing office rules, said Saturday.

The South's Yonhap news agency said Seoul had deployed missiles, artillery and other weapons systems near the border to swiftly deal with any possible North Korean provocation, but the ministry did not confirm the reports.

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South Korean army soldiers adjust equipment used for propaganda broadcasts near the border area betw …

Officials say broadcasts from the South's loudspeakers can travel about 10 kilometers (6 miles) during the day and 24 kilometers (15 miles) at night. That reaches many of the huge force of North Korean soldiers stationed near the border and also residents in border towns such as Kaesong, where the Koreas jointly operate an industrial park that has been a valuable cash source for the impoverished North.

Seoul also planned to use mobile speakers to broadcast from a small South Korean island just a few kilometers (miles) away from North Korean shores.

While the South's broadcasts also include news and pop music, much of the programming challenges North Korea's government more directly.

"We hope that our fellow Koreans in the North will be able to live in (a) society that doesn't invade individual lives as soon as possible," a female presenter said in parts of the broadcast that officials revealed to South Korean media. "Countries run by dictatorships even try to control human instincts."

Marathon talks by the Koreas in August eased anger and stopped the broadcasts, which Seoul started after blaming North Korean land mines for maiming two South Korean soldiers. It might be more difficult to do so now. Seoul can't stand down easily, some analysts say, and it's highly unlikely that the North will express regret for its nuclear test, which is a source of intense national pride.

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Map locates North Korea's nuclear facilities and recent test site.; 2c x 4 inches; 96.3 mm x 101 …

The fresh broadcasts came as world powers sought to find other ways to punish the North for conducting what it said was its first hydrogen bomb test Wednesday.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry urged China, the North's only major ally and its biggest aid provider, to end "business as usual" with North Korea.

Diplomats at a U.N. Security Council emergency session pledged to swiftly pursue new sanctions. For current sanctions and any new penalties to work, better cooperation and stronger implementation from China is seen as key.

South Korean and U.S. military leaders also have discussed the deployment of U.S. "strategic assets," Seoul's Defense Ministry said. Officials refused to elaborate, but the assets likely are B-52 bombers, F-22 stealth fighters and nuclear-powered submarines.

After North Korea's third nuclear test in 2013, the U.S. took the unusual step of sending its most powerful warplanes — B-2 stealth bombers, F-22 stealth fighters and B-52 bombers — to drills with South Korea in a show of force. B-2 and B-52 bombers are capable of delivering nuclear weapons.

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South Korean soldiers stand in front of equipment used for propaganda broadcasts near the border are …

It may take weeks or longer to confirm or refute the North's claim that it successfully tested a hydrogen bomb, which would mark a major and unanticipated advance for its still-limited nuclear arsenal. Outside experts are skeptical the blast was a hydrogen bomb, but even a test of an atomic bomb would push North Korea closer to building a nuclear warhead small enough to place on a long-range missile.

Late Friday, the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety said a small amount of radioactive elements was found in air samples collected from the peninsula's eastern seas after the blast, but the measured amount was too small to determine whether the North had really detonated a nuclear device. The institute will continue to collect and analyze more samples.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, meanwhile, asked South Korea to refrain from the propaganda broadcasts. But South Korea sees K-pop and propaganda as quick ways to show its displeasure — and a guaranteed irritant to the North's sensitive and proud leadership.

The broadcasts include Korean pop songs, world news and weather forecasts as well as criticism of the North's nuclear test, its troubled economy and dire human rights conditions, according to Seoul's Defense Ministry.

Performers on Seoul's propaganda playlist include a female K-pop band that rose to fame when its members fell multiple times on stage, a middle-aged singer who rose from obscurity last year with a song about living for 100 years and songs by a young female singer, IU, whose sweet, girlish voice might be aimed at North Korean soldiers deployed near the border.

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A South Korean soldier adjusts equipment used for the propaganda broadcasts at a studio near the bor …

North Koreans are prohibited from listening to K-pop, but defectors have said their countrymen enjoy music and other elements of South Korea popular culture that are smuggled into the country on USB sticks and DVDs.

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Associated Press writer Hyung-jin Kim contributed to this report.

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Follow Foster Klug, AP's Seoul bureau chief, on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@APKlug. Follow Kim Tong-hyung at www.twitter.com/@kimtonghyung