Syria: Government to allow UN to visit chemical weapons scene, state media reports

The Syrian government has given UN inspectors permission to visit the site of an alleged chemical weapons attack near Damascus. In a statement broadcast on Syrian state TV, the foreign ministry of Bashar Al Assad's government said an agreement to allow UN chemical weapons experts "to investigate allegations of chemical weapons use in Damascus province" had been concluded with the UN's disarment chief, Angela Kane, on Sunday. The statement added that the agreement was "effective immediately", and a spokesperson for UN secretary General Ban Ki Moon subsequently announced that the inspectors were "preparing to conduct on-site fact-finding activities", with investigations starting on Monday. Activists say hundreds of people, including children, were killed when government forces used chemical weapons in an opposition stronghold - the government has blamed "terrorists" for the incident. Earlier, a senior US official accused the Syrian authorities of intentionally delaying the UN team's arrival at the site "in order to faciliate the degradation of evidence of their use of chemical weapons".