UN Security Council members held informal discussions on Friday with Syrian opposition leaders for the first time since the conflict erupted in March 2011, dpa reported.
The closed-door meeting was organized by British ambassador Mark Lyall Grant at UN headquarters in New York in a bid to update the 15 council members on the complex situation in Syria.
Syria's ambassador to the UN, Bashar Jaafari, protested that the meeting was "illegal" as the UN still recognizes his government.
More than 100,000 people have been killed in Syria's civil war, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday.
"The situation in Syria is appalling," Ban said, after meeting US Secretary of State John Kerry in New York, and called for efforts to find a political solution to end the 28-month conflict.
"The conflict has killed more than 100,000 people and displaced millions of people and we have to bring it to an end," Ban said. The latest recent UN estimate of the death toll was 93,000.
On Thursday, the Syrian National Coalition, headed by Ahmad al-Jarba, met with Kerry and German Ambassador Peter Wittig in New York.