Syria regime, opposition, to talk on July 10

Violence continues to unfold across Syria Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime has called members of the opposition and intellectuals for July 10 talks on the wave of protest sweeping the country, the official SANA news agency reported Monday. The move came after more than 100 dissidents heard calls for a peaceful transition to democracy at a public meeting in the capital that they said was unprecedented in five decades of iron-fisted Baath party rule.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad spoke Tuesday of the legitimate demands of his people during a meeting with visiting US congressman Dennis Kucinich, SANA state news agency said.
Assad told the anti-war Democratic Representative of "current events in Syria and the implementation of reforms" during their talks in Damascus, the agency reported.
The president told Kucinich that "Syrians have legitimate claims which the state is currently meeting and that armed groups have been exploiting these demands to create chaos and destabilise the country."
Syrian opposition activists held a public conference Monday in Damascus to discuss ways to end the four month crisis gripping the Arab nation. According to AFP, more than 100 dissidents gathered in a hotel, holding a minute of silence to remember those slain in the violence that has rocked Syria since mid-March. 
Chris Doyle, the director for The Council for the Advancement of Arab-British Understanding, said Monday that "such a conference has not happened in years."and he hopes it is given every chance to succeed.
"It is a very positive sign that the regime has approved such a meeting at the highest levels.  It is vital for a national dialogue to take place that opponents of the regime are allowed to meet together and agree on a common platform."
According to the meeting's organizers, the participants are not associated with any political party.
The meeting follows a speech by President Bashar Assad that encouraged the development of a "national dialogue" to combat the unrest that has occurred in the wake of the "Arab Spring."
"We can say that national dialogue is the slogan of the next stage," he said. "The national dialogue could lead to amendments of the constitution or to a new constitution."
But Assad said he refused to reform Syria under "chaos," drawing a pledge from the pro-democracy activists who have spearheaded the protests that their "revolution" would go on.
Demonstrators again took to the streets later the same day, meeting deadly violence from the security forces.
The Coordination Committee, an umbrella group of activists, said dialogue was pointless as long as Assad remained in power.
"We consider any dialogue useless that does not turn the page on the current regime," it said.
In the days since Assad's speech, the security forces have pressed their deadly sweep for dissidents towards Syria's borders sending around 11,000 refugees fleeing into Turkey and hundreds more in to Lebanon.
Some 300 students detained last week after a rare protest in Syria's second-largest city Aleppo have been charged with "sabotage" and "insulting the president," a human rights activist said Monday.
"The 304 students were brought before court yesterday (Sunday). They were arrested last week in Aleppo's University City," said Radif Mustafa, the chairman of the Kurdish Human Rights Committee.
"It is a new sign that the authorities are set on deepening the crisis rather than finding political solutions," he added.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said on Sunday that Assad had passed the "point of no return".
"I would be happy to admit I'm wrong, but I don't think so," he told France's RTL radio.
"I regret that the repression continues to unfold in conditions which calls into question the region's security," he said.
Pro-government daily Al-Watan said on Sunday that the border areas near Turkey being targeted by the military had been used as a "key crossing for armed groups".
Syrian military spokesman Major General Riad Haddad, said 1,300 members of the security forces had been killed in the revolt.
But foreign governments have refused to accept the contention that the protests are the work of armed gangs supported from abroad.
"We're just not buying it," US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said last week.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says 1,342 civilians have been killed in the government's crackdown and that 342 security force personnel have also died.