Syria to allow UN inspect 'gas attack' site

Syrian state media says the government has reached an agreement with the United Nations to allow a UN team of experts to visit the site of last week’s alleged chemical weapons attack.

State TV also said in a statement that the two sides are working to set the date and time of the visit to the agreed upon locations outside Damascus purportedly hit by chemical agents on August 22.

The purported chemical attack that activists say killed hundreds of civilians in rebel-held areas around Damascus took place on Wednesday, August 21.

The discrepancy in the dates could not be immediately reconciled.

Earlier a senior US administration official said there is “very little doubt” that a chemical weapon was used by the Syrian regime against civilians in an incident that killed at least a hundred people last week.

The official said that the US intelligence community based its assessment given to the White House on “the reported number of victims, reported symptoms of those who were killed or injured, and witness accounts.”

The official said the White House believes the Syrian government is barring a UN investigative team immediate access to the site of a reported August 21 chemical weapons attack in the Damascus suburbs in order to give the evidence of the attack time to degrade.