A human rights organisation in Syria says security forces have killed at least 12 people during funerals for pro-democracy demonstrators shot dead the day before.
The killings reportedly took place in Damascus and two other cities and towns although the deaths cannot be independently verified.
All over the country, Syrians turned out to bury the 80 or more protesters shot dead on Friday, reportedly by state security forces in civilian clothes.
It was the worst bloodshed in Syria since anti-government protests erupted five weeks ago.
But even as the mourners buried the dead, they too were shot and killed.
Many of them were at the southern town of Ezreh.
Two independent Syrian MPs have told Al Jazeera television they are resigning in frustration at not being able to protect their constituents.
They were the first resignations from within Bashar al-Assad's autocratic rule.
But the ongoing violence shows the president will not tolerate any show of dissent, despite agreeing to revoke Syria's decades-old emergency laws last week.
'Down with Bashar!'
Witnesses said the mourners were chanting: "Bashar al-Assad, you traitor! Long live Syria, down with Bashar!"
"There was a heavy volley of gunfire in our direction as we approached Izra'a to join the funerals of martyrs," a witness in the southern town of Izra'a said.
Independent human rights organisation Sawasiah said security forces killed mourners in Damascus and surrounding areas and near Izra'a.
Security forces opened fire in Damascus's Douma suburb, wounding three people, witnesses there said.
Mourners in Harasta, a town near Damascus, also came under fire from security forces, before staging a sit-in to demand the release of detainees arrested in the last few weeks.
Protesters staged another sit-in after a funeral for four people from Irbeen, near Damascus.
"We are not leaving until the political prisoners are released," one protester said by phone.
Friday was by far the bloodiest day in over a month of demonstrations to demand political freedoms and an end to corruption, with at least 100 people killed, according to two activists.
The government-appointed mufti, or Muslim preacher, for Deraa has resigned in protest.
"Being assigned to give fatwas [religious edicts], I submit my resignation as a result of the fall of victims and martyrs by police fire," Rezq Abdulrahman Abazeid told Al Jazeera.
'Anger is rising'
The violence brings the death toll to more than 300 since unrest broke out on March 18 in Deraa, according to activists.
Damascus remained tense on Saturday and many people stayed indoors, one activist in the capital said
"This is becoming like a snowball and getting bigger and bigger every week. Anger is rising, the street is boiling," he said.
US president Barack Obama condemned the violence and accused Mr Assad of seeking help from Iran.
"This outrageous use of violence to quell protests must come to an end now," he said in a statement.
"Instead of listening to their own people, president Assad is blaming outsiders while seeking Iranian assistance in repressing Syria's citizens."
A Syrian government source said in a statement published on official state media that Mr Obama's statement "was not based on objective vision."
Aided by his family and a pervasive security apparatus, Mr Assad, 45, has absolute power, having ignored demands to transform the anachronistic autocratic system he inherited when he succeeded his late father, president Hafez al-Assad, in 2000
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