Iran has lashed out at Turkey for requesting Nato to supply it with Patriot surface-to-air missiles to deploy along the border with Syria, denouncing the step by Ankara as counterproductive.

A bomb blast in a Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus killed four people and seriously wounded a member of a faction that has backed Syrian President Bashar Assad in the country’s bitter civil war, activists said today.

Syrian troops have shelled southern neighbourhoods of the capital as they try to advance in rebel-held areas, activists said today.