Syria's cabinet resigns

Syrian state-run television says the country's cabinet has resigned as Syria experiences its worst unrest in decades.

President Bashar Assad accepted the cabinet's resignation following a meeting Tuesday in Damascus. The resignation is the latest concession by the government aimed at appeasing more than a week of mass protests.

The resignations will not affect Assad, who holds the lion's share of power in the authoritarian regime

Assad is expected to address the nation in the next 24 hours to announce he is lifting a nearly 50-year emergency law and moving to annul other harsh restrictions on civil liberties and political freedoms.

Earlier, hundreds of thousands of supporters of Syria's hard-line regime poured into the streets to counter a wave of popular dissent that has posed the most serious threat to Assad's rule.

At least 61 people have been killed since the protests exploded on March 18 and led to a swift crackdown by security forces, according to Human Rights Watch.

Assad, whose family has controlled Syria for four decades and has a history of brutally crushing dissent, is trying to calm the growing fury with a string of concessions in the nation of 23 million.