REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, DAMASCUS -- The toll in Syrian government air strikes on a rebel-held town outside Damascus neared 100 Monday, as the UN's humanitarian chief expressed horror and appealed for civilians to be protected.

Sunday's series of raids on the town of Douma, in the rebel bastion of Eastern Ghouta, was one of the bloodiest regime attacks in Syria's four-year war.

They came almost exactly two years after devastating chemical weapons attacks on the same region that much of the international community blamed on the Syrian government.

The National Coalition, Syria's main opposition body in exile, condemned both the air strikes and the "lukewarm response" by the international community towards the war's civilian casualties.

At least 96 people were killed in the 10 air strikes on a marketplace, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor.

Another 240 people were wounded, and the death toll continues to rise as some of those in a serious condition succumb to their injuries.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said government aircraft carried out another four air strikes on Douma on Monday morning, but he had no immediate details on casualties.

An AFP photographer on Sunday described the attack as the worst he had covered in the town.

He saw dozens of bodies lined up on the bloodied floors of one of Douma's makeshift clinics, as medics struggled to treat waves of wounded.

Two young boys with bloodied faces sat on a stretcher as they awaited treatment, one resting as though exhausted while the other cried.

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