French President Hollande says France is prepared to take action against those responsible for gassing people in Syria, reports Pantagraph.com.
Speaking Tuesday at a conference with France's ambassadors, Hollande said: ``France is ready to punish those who took the heinous decision to gas innocents'' in Syria last week.
Earlier in the day, Syria's foreign minister said Tuesday his country would defend itself using ``all means available'' in case of a U.S. strike, denying his government was behind an alleged chemical weapons attack near Damascus and challenging Washington to present proof backing up its accusations.
The United Nations said that its team of chemical weapons experts in Syria delayed a second trip to investigate an alleged poison gas attack near Damascus by one day for security reasons.
Walid al-Moallem, speaking at a press conference in Damascus, likened U.S. allegations that President Bashar Assad's regime was behind a purported poison gas attack to false American charges that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction before the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of that country.
Read more of this AP report published by Pantagraph.com.