ANKARA: Turkey called for Syria to immediately halt a violent crackdown on protesters and pass democratic reforms, in a meeting on Thursday between Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and a top Syrian envoy.

The crackdown, which Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has condemned as “savagery,” has tested relations between the two countries, and Turkey has given sanctuary to some 8,900 Syrian refugees who have streamed across the border.

“We want a strong, stable, prosperous Syria. To achieve this we believe it necessary to implement the comprehensive reform process toward democratization guaranteed by (President) Bashar Assad,” Davutoglu told reporters after three hours of talks with Syria’s Hassan Turkmani on Thursday morning.

“In order to achieve this the violence must stop immediately. Yesterday I clearly saw the fear in the eyes of the people and I shared this,” he added, describing talks with Turkmani as friendly and Syria as Turkey’s “closest friend.”

On Thursday afternoon Davutoglu met with Ankara’s ambassadors to the Middle East, United States and some EU countries to discuss Syria and policy across the region.

Former adviser to Erdogan, Nabi Avci, said Turkey was dismayed by Syria’s response to its requests that it refrain from using violence against civilians and undertake reforms.

“Turkey’s efforts to bring about peaceful change in Syria will continue,” Avci said in Istanbul.

“The response of the Syrian regime so far has been, unfortunately, unhelpful and disappointing,” said Avci, elected a member of Parliament for the ruling AK party in Sunday’s vote.

Asked about the possibility the Turkish military could enforce a buffer zone on Syrian territory to protect civilians, Avci said Turkey had no plan for military intervention in Syria.

But he said Turkey constantly reminded the Syrian government that intervention could become part of the international community’s agenda, and urged Damascus to make rational choices.

“We are trying our best for the last chance for the Syrian regime,” he said.

Meanwhile, Syrian tanks and armored vehicles reinforced positions around the northern town of Maarat Al-Numaan on Thursday after thousands of people fled following the crackdown.

Residents and a Syrian rights group said dozens of tanks and personnel carriers also deployed around Khan Sheikhoun, a town about 30 km south of Maarat Al-Numaan on the main north-south highway linking Damascus and Aleppo.

Residents say Syrian forces have arrested hundreds of people in villages close to Jisr Al-Shughour after an assault on the town on Sunday, and are now moving toward Maarat Al-Numaan.

Troops were deployed in Khan Sheikhoun and in villages to the east and west of Maarat Al-Numaan, while others were being airlifted to a staging camp 2 km away, they said.

Rami Abdulrahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said villagers had started to stream out of Khan Sheikhoun, which security forces had surrounded on three sides.

“The troops are firing randomly at the outskirts of Maarat Al-Numaan to scare the population, which drove more people to flee tonight,” one witness in the village of Maarshamsha on the edge of Maarat Al-Numaan told Reuters by telephone late on Wednesday.

He said the gunfire killed one man, Mohammad Al-Abdallah, and that the shooting was so heavy that he had to be buried in the backyard of his house.

In the Damascus suburb of Harasta, security forces fired live ammunition to disperse a night protest by 200 women demanding the release of their husbands and relatives, arrested in an intensifying security sweep to put down the three-month uprising, a witness said.

“They carried placards saying ‘Where is my husband?’ and ‘Where is my brother?’ and pictures of the prisoners. No one was hurt but it was barely 10 minutes into the demonstration when they opened fire,” said the witness.