The Syrian government agreed today to allow United Nations inspectors to investigate allegations of a chemical weapon attack near Damascus last week.

 United Kingdom Foreign Secretary warned that the evidence could have been tampered in the 5 days that have elapsed since the alleged attack, stating

“Much of the evidence could have been destroyed by artillery bombardment; other evidence could have become degraded over the last few days; and other evidence could have been tampered with.”

The UN team will be granted access to the site on Monday,

"The FARC has decided to pause the discussions at the table, to focus exclusively on analysing the implications of the government's proposal,"

"The FARC has left the negotiating table to study the proposal and it's legitimate and valid that it should, but time is passing and the patience of the Colombian people has a limit,"

"We are going to assess their statement, their behaviour toward the government initiative [which aims] to accelerate the solution of the conflict,"

"In this process, the one who makes pauses and establishes the conditions, is not the FARC."

After discussions over  last week’s chemical weapons attack in Syria , David Cameron and Barack Obama, agreed that the crisis had been taken to a new level and would require a ‘serious  response’.

A spokesman for the Prime Minister said,

“The Prime Minister and President Obama, are both gravely concerned by the attack that took place in Damascus on Wednesday and the increasing signs that this was a significant chemical weapons attack carried out by the Syrian regime against its own people. The UN Security Council has called for immediate access for the UN investigators on the ground in Damascus. The fact that President Assad has failed to co-operate with the UN suggests that the regime has something to hide.”

“They reiterated that significant use of chemical weapons would merit a serious response from the international community and both have tasked officials to examine al the options. They agreed that it is vital that the world upholds the prohibition on the use of chemical weapons and deters further outrages.”

The British Foreign Secretary, William Hague, suggested today that the only “plausible explanation” for the deaths of 1300 people outside Damascus on was a chemical attack orchestrated by Bashar Assad’s regime.

Speaking at the Foreign Office, Hague warned that should the current United Nations weapons inspectors be refused access to the scene, the United Kingdom would go back to the Security Council to secure a stronger mandate for action in Syria.

Outlining that accountability was an immediate priority he stated,

“We are working with countries all over the world to try to bring this about and to try to establish the truth to the satisfaction of the world about what is clearly a terrible atrocity.

“The only possible explanation of what we have been able to see is that it was a chemical attack and clearly many hundreds of people have been killed, some of the estimates are well over 1,000”

“The United Kingdom called the meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday night and the Security Council members we expressed their support for the UN team to go there.”

“I discussed with the UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon, and he agreed time is of the essence, that he is pressing for the UN team to be able to gain unimpeded access to the site.

The Foreign Secretary has been involved with a series of talks with key international figures, including US secretary of State John Kerry and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

Speaking on the issue United States president Barack Obama suggested that US intervention was only likely with a strong UN mandate, stating,

“If the US goes in and attacks another country without a UN mandate and without clear evidence that can be presented, then there are questions in terms of whether international law supports it, do we have the coalition to make it work.”

"The notion that the US can somehow solve what is a sectarian, complex problem inside of Syria sometimes is overstated."

"I know that some people in the world would like to say that this is some kind of conspiracy brought about by the opposition in Syria,"

"I think the chances of that are vanishingly small and so we do believe that this is a chemical attack by the Assad regime."

The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced the assignment of a disarmament official to negotiate a visit for UN investigators to verify alleged chemical weapons usage.

The United Nations high representative for disarmament affairs, Angela Kane, will speak to the government of Bashar al-Assad in an attempt to gain access to the site of Wednesday’s alleged chemical attack.

Former Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, could be freed from prison on Thursday, after a court in Cairo ordered his release.

The 85-year old was sentenced for life in a corruption case last year, however an appeal was successful and a retrial was ordered.

He was imprisoned over the acceptance of gifts from a state-run publisher and still faces separate charges for the killing of protestors in the 2011 uprising.

Hundreds of people are believed to have been killed in an evident gas attack on rebel-held parts of eastern Damascus.

The Syrian government acknowledged it had launched a major offensive though denied using chemical weapons.

The United Nations Security Council, in response, outlined that it was necessary to clarify what happened in the alleged chemical attack, stating,

“There is strong concern among council members about the allegations and a general sense that there must be clarity on what happened and the situation must be followed closely.”

The former Pakistani president, Pervez Musharraf, has been charged with the killing of opposition leader and former Prime Minister Benezir Bhutto.

The ex-army chief denies all charges and claims they are politically motivated.

Bhutto was killed at an election rally in 2007, blamed by the then Musharraf-government on the Taliban.

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The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal (KLWCT) will hear cases of war crimes and genocide against a retired Israeli army general, Amos Yaron, from the 21^st to the 24^th of August.

The KLWCT was founded in 2008 to act as a peoples’ initiative to provide an avenue to for victims of such crimes to file their complaints and receive justice in a court of law.

According to the Centre for Research on Globilization, judges on the tribunal include experienced judges from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and experts from the International Court of Justice and International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

The European Union held a first round of talks today to address the escalating violence in Egypt.

The ambassadors of the EU’s political security Committee were called away from their summer break for talks in Brussels.

Amidst warnings of heightening violence, the presidents of the European Council and European Commission said in a joint statement, that the Union would review its relations with Cairo.

In their joint statement Herman Van Rompuy and Jose Manuel Barroso, also reiterated,

“The calls for democracy and fundamental freedoms from the Egyptian population cannot be disregarded, much less washed away in blood.”