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31 October 2013 Last updated at 19:42 ET Share this page Email Print Share this page2.6KShareFacebookTwitter Syria chemical weapons equipment destroyed, says OPCW Advertisement $render("advert-post-script-load"); Jerry Smith, OPCW: "We have... observed all of the destruction activities" Continue reading the main story Syria conflict Arms destruction Chemical stockpile 'Please let it be over' Assad opponents Syria's declared equipment for producing, mixing and filling chemical weapons has been destroyed, the international watchdog says. This comes a day before the deadline set by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). The weapons have been placed under seal, an OPCW spokesman said. Inspectors were sent to Syria following allegations, denied by the government, that its forces had used chemical weapons in civilian areas. Continue reading the main story Analysis Jonathan Marcus BBC diplomatic correspondent The achievement of this crucial initial target is an important moment for the chemical weapons destruction effort in Syria. The inspectors' first task was to move swiftly to prevent the government from producing any more chemical agent and to destroy facilities and equipment used for mixing agents and filling munitions. Production facilities will be closely monitored to ensure that there are no moves to repair them. The next deadline is mid-November, by which time the OPCW and the Syrians must agree a detailed plan to destroy Syria's chemical weapons stockpile. All sorts of questions are raised. Where will this destruction be carried out ? Who will provide the necessary equipment and so on? Western intelligence agencies will be studying Syria's declarations carefully. They will be eager to direct inspectors to additional locations if there are any grounds to believe that Damascus has been less than frank in its disclosures. The inspections were agreed between Russia and the US after Washington threatened to use force in Syria. Syria's Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad

Syria's declared equipment for producing, mixing and filling chemical weapons has been destroyed, the international watchdog says.

nspectors were sent to Syria following allegations, denied by the government, that its forces had used chemical weapons in civilian areas.

Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel has said it is "really not on" for friends to spy on each other, referring to alleged US snooping on her phone calls.

The spying row threatens to overshadow EU talks on economic growth and migration to the EU. Mrs Merkel has demanded a "complete explanation" of the claims, which came out in the German media.

In a separate development, Italy's weekly L'Espresso reported that the US and UK had been spying on Italian internet and phone traffic.

US intelligence chief James Clapper has denied reports that US spies recorded data from 70 million phone calls in France in a single 30-day period.

The director of national intelligence said the report in Le Monde newspaper contained "misleading information".

Both reports were based on leaks from fugitive ex-US intelligence worker Edward Snowden.

Fresh reports in German media based on leaked US intelligence documents are prompting damaging new questions about the extent of US surveillance.

Another report says Mr Obama was told in 2010 about the surveillance and failed to stop it.

The spy row has led to the worst diplomatic crisis betweeen the two countries in living memory.

new details about the suspect, Usaama Rahim, and an alleged plot to attack conservative activist and Muhammad cartoon contest sponsor Pamela Geller are emerging.

“It’s chilling. It is chilling,” Geller told ABC News’ Tom Llamas in a phone interview Wednesday night. “When you consider that they want to cut my head off and leave it on my chest the way they did Foley and the other aid workers in the Middle East because of a cartoon, this is the state of freedom in this country.”

saying she feared for her safety.

prominent human rights group accused the Syrian government Wednesday of using toxic chemicals during a recent surge in attacks involving barrel bombs on rebel-held areas in northern Syria.

Assad’s government has been accused by Western countries of using chemical weapons over the course of the four-year conflict, including an attack involving sarin gas in 2013 that killed hundreds of people in a suburb of the capital.

Regime opponents and ­activists allege that Assad’s forces have punished residents in rebel-controlled areas with barrages of the crude bombs, which are built from oil barrels or gas cylinders and can be filled with toxic chemicals such as chlorine gas

Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam had just revealed that authorities believe 43 missing students were kidnapped, executed and dumped in a river -- and he was ready to call it a day.

It's one of the most serious cases in the contemporary history of Mexico and Latin America

. He compared it to a massacre of students during a Mexico City demonstration in 1968.

With 100 or so colleges under investigation by the federal government for the way they have handled allegations of sexual assault, with the president and member of Congress and countless advocacy groups weighing in, with some particularly horrifying cases making headlines and scores of other allegations simmering within campus communities, it’s a minefield.

Not everyone disagreed with Patton, who is president of the alumni class of 1977.

When people take the issue seriously, Daniels said, people can do something about it; work on education, work on prevention, work on supporting the victims.

that a 13-year-old girl had been abducted for 30 hours and gang-raped by Arab men in Berlin earlier this month.

But a subsequent medical exam found no evidence of rape or sexual intercourse, and the girl changed her story.

I truly hope that these migration problems will not lead to attempts to 'gloss over' reality for political motives -- that would be just wrong," he said.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange may at last leave the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he has been holed up for three and a half years.

But even though he may leave with the support of a United Nations working group, he is still likely to be arrested in Britain on sex crime charges for alleged crimes in Sweden that date back several years.

Assange had said he would surrender to British police for arrest Friday if the U.N. group ruled he had not been unlawfully detained. However, any judgment by the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention would be only a "moral recommendation" and would not be legally binding.

Islamist extremism: Why young people are being drawn to it

She was speaking after a 15-year-old boy was charged with conspiracy in connection with an alleged terror plot in Australia.

Last month, reports said one of two girls who ran away from their home in Austria to join the so-called Islamic State in Syria had been beaten to death while trying to escape. She was 17.

A former Oklahoma City police officer was convicted Thursday of raping and sexually victimizing eight women on his police beat in a minority, low-income neighborhood.

Daniel Holtzclaw, who turned 29 Thursday, sobbed as the verdict was read aloud. Jurors convicted him on 18 counts involving eight of the 13 women who had accused him; the jury acquitted him on another 18 counts.

CBS affiliate KWTV reported the jury deliberated for 45 hours before finding Holtzclaw guilty on four counts of first-degree rape, one count of second-degree rape, six counts of sexual battery, four counts of forcible sodomy and three counts of procuring lewd acts.

Athletics doping crisis: UK Athletics wants to reset world records

The sport's governing body has made 14 proposals, among them longer bans for drug cheats and a public register of tested athletes.

UKA chairman Ed Warner said it was time for "radical reform", adding: "The integrity of athletics was challenged as never before in 2015."

Recently liberated Ramadi citizens are telling media the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) tortured them and used them as human shields when Iraqi forces moved into the city.

The Islamic State forced out Iraqi forces in Ramadi in mid-May 2015. The militants stole weapons and captured the military headquarters. They then murdered anyone “loyal to the government.”

As Iraqi forces moved in during December, the Islamic State grew paranoid and used the civilians as human shields. One man said the militants forced people to remain in their houses and could only leave with permission.

Indonesian police have arrested 12 people in connection with Thursday's deadly attack in front of a Starbucks in central Jakarta, including one accused of having received a wire transfer from the alleged ISIS-linked operative suspected of orchestrating the assault, the country's police chief said Saturday.

one is suspected to have received a money transfer from the alleged mastermind, Bahrun Naim, an Indonesian militant who authorities believed to have conducted the operation from ISIS' headquarters in Syria, national Police Chief Badrodin Haiti said.

They also opened fire at people on the street. One of the injured was also a foreigner.

Numerous studies have found that voter fraud is far from a major issue in the U.S., and in-person fraud of the sort Trump and Kobach like to talk about — things like non-citizens showing up to vote or people returning to vote multiple times under different names — is vanishingly rare. A 2007 study by NYU’s Brennan Center for Justice memorably found that an individual American is more likely to get struck by lightning than to commit in-person voter fraud.

as of last summer, 68 percent of Republicans thought millions of illegal immigrants had voted in 2016, and almost three quarters said voter fraud happens “somewhat” or “very often.” The same survey found that nearly half of Republicans believed Trump had won the popular vote.

The idea that Nixon gracefully and expeditiously chose not to fight the outcome is a myth, the historian David Greenberg demonstrated back in 2000. Nixon did, however, eventually give in — but in the process, he turned the notion that the Democrats had stolen the election into an article of faith among Republicans, especially conservative ones.

. Why did Harvey Weinstein succeed in allegedly abusing dozens of women for dozens of years before anyone did anything about it? Why did Les Moonves allegedly get to spend 30 years systemically traumatizing his employees at CBS?

The answer, in large part, is that just like what happened at Georgetown Prep stayed at Georgetown Prep, what happened in Hollywood stayed in Hollywood, and what happened at NBC or CBS or some of those restaurants headed by celebrity chefs stayed there, too.

The struggle of a woman who levels an allegation against one of these men is so great because, in reality, she is never challenging only one man. She is challenging the clique and the culture he belongs to — his high school, his college, his country club, his political party, or his industry, from filmmaking to media moguling to restaurateuring.

The injustice, in fact, is largely optical. The question before us, after all, is not whether to punish Kavanaugh or whether to assign liability to him. It’s whether to bestow on him an immense honor that comes with great power. Kavanaugh is applying for a much-coveted job. And the burden of convincing in such situations always lies with the applicant. The standard for elevation to the nation’s highest court is not that the nominee established a “reasonable doubt” that the serious allegations against him were true.

There is no known standard of evidence applicable here. Realistically, senators make up their own standard, and decide whether Kavanaugh has satisfied it. For most senators, in fact, there’s no standard of evidence at all, for their support for or opposition to him does not depend on the evidence. It is ideological in character.

It is possible to imagine his testimony shoring up support among those who want to support him but leaving everyone else with real doubt. This would be, in my view, a disaster for anyone who believes in apolitical courts. And it is not what Kavanaugh should want

George HW Bush apologizes actress he sexually assaulted

Bush has apologized saying it was an 'attempt at humor.' 

President George H.W. Bush apologizes after actress claimed he 'sexually assaulted' her and insists his 'attempt at humor' was misinterpreted