A policy officer at the European Union's delegation in Syria was killed in a rocket attack on a Damascus suburb, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton has confirmed.

Ahmad Shihadeh was killed while giving humanitarian help to people in the suburb of Deraya, where he lived, Ms Ashton said.

She said:"I call again on all sides to take urgent steps to end the violence, which has led to the deaths of some 100,000 innocent citizens and over one million refugees seeking shelter in neighbouring countries."

The EU withdrew international staff from its office in Damascus in December because of the worsening violence in Syria, which has been torn by a two-year-old uprising against President Bashar al Assad.

Local staff remained in Syria but are not going to the EU delegation, which is temporarily closed.

Mr Shihadeh was killed on Tuesday as Britain and France raise pressure on other EU members to lift a ban on supplying arms to Syria, where rebels are outgunned by Mr Assad's forces.

Heavy fighting erupted in an area between Damascus and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights yesterday in what could be a new battlefront between Syrian troops and rebels, opposition sources said.

Rebel fighters attacked an army barracks manned by elite Republican Guards and the Fourth Mechanised Division, headed by Mr Assad's brother Maher, in Khan Sheih, four miles from Damascus, sources said.

Clashes intensified three days after Sunni Muslim rebels overran a missile squadron in the area, killing 30 soldiers, mostly from Mr Assad's minority Alawite sect, the sources said.

A rebel commander in contact with fighters said a force of some 1000 insurgents had moved into Khan Sheih, which is 15 miles from the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in 1967.

He said rebels had also attacked Syrian army positions in the town of Qunaitra, near the ceasefire line with Israel, and further south near the Golan.