For anyone afflicted with a predisposition towards pessimism, these are trying times.

Syria has handed over the remaining 100 tonnes of toxic material it declared to the global chemical weapons watchdog, clearing the way for destruction of the stockpile at sea, sources said yesterday.

Syrian rebels bombed a once luxurious, historic hotel being used as a government army base in the northern city of Aleppo, levelling the building and causing multiple casualties in a giant explosion carried off by digging tunnels under the complex, activists and militants said.

Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama has rejected a request from the United States for the tiny impoverished Balkan nation to host the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile.