He said calls were being made to all political faction leaders to contain the crisis.

WSJ: Syria Sends Shocks Through Lebanon, Mideast

While regional peace conferences are always risky enterprises, it's difficult to imagine bringing a cease-fire to the Syrian situation without all parties that border that state or who have armed and financed any faction in the dispute being at the conference table.

CNN: The only glimmer of hope for Syria

For all of their visibility, deep-pocketed celebrities make up just a tiny faction of the guild.

FORBES: Labor

"We have decided - the CDU-CSU faction in the Bundestag - that there would be no more expansion at all, " he told BBC Radio 4's World at One programme.

BBC: Antonis Samaras

Shortly after French forces invaded last month, a faction called the Islamic Movement for Azawad said it was splitting from Ansar Dine, and rejecting "all forms of extremism and terrorism".

BBC: Why the Sahara is not the 'new Afghanistan'