Syria: Ten people killed in Damascus Old City explosion - Metro

The blast struck a police station in the Bab Touma neighbourhood mostly inhabited by Syria's Christian minority that is popular with shoppers, wounding 29 others.

State news agency Sana said a taxi-rigged with explosives has been detonated in an attack that bore the hallmarks of tactics employed by Islamist groups fighting alongside rebels who have previously targeted security sites in the capital.

Earlier, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the death-toll as ten.

Mr Brahimi was meeting with Mr al-Assad on the third day of his most recent visit to the country. He is calling for a truce between government forces and rebel fighters for the four-day Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, which begins on October 26.

Warring factions have agreed to ceasefires in the past but then continued fighting nevertheless.

Speaking to reporters after the behind-closed-doors meeting with Mr al-Assad, the Algerian diplomat, who replaced former UN secretary general Kofi Annan as peace envoy, confirmed he had also met with opposition groups.

He said the 'overwhelming' response was to be favourable towards a ceasefire during Eid but that he had received 'promises' not a 'commitment'.

Sana meanwhile said of the president: 'The president said he is open to any sincere effort to find a political solution to the crisis on the basis of respecting the Syrian sovereignty and rejecting foreign interference.

'If we find that this calm is actually achieved during the Eid and continued, we will try to build on it.

'The Syrian people expect more than a truce for a few days and it is their right, but all we can promise is that we will work hard to achieve their aspirations.'

More than 33,000 people are thought to have died in the 19-month conflict, which has left at least one million people internally displaced and created 500,000 refugees.

The conflict began when the al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests at the height of the Arab Spring, prompting opposition groups to take up arms against the government.

Amid repeated failed attempts by the international community for a united response to the violence, the conflict escalated into a full-blown civil war.

PICTURES: Syrian civil war