The US urged members of the UN Security Council to lift the arms embargo on the Somalian government, citing stability within the state.

The embargo was imposed 21 years ago.

Last week the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon asserted that the embargo should be lifted in order to aid Somalian security forces in their fight against al Shabaab militants.

The deputy UN ambassador for Somalia, Idd Beddel Mohamed, told Reuters:

"There are no Somali warlords that threaten peace and stability in Somalia,"

"They are normal citizens now, members of parliament. The embargo must be lifted."

Urging the Assad regime to enter into talks to avoid further violence, the leader of the Syrian opposition, Moaz Alkhatib, offered the regime a peaceful exit.

Suggesting the Assad regime's vice President, Farouq al-Shara, as a negotiator for the talks, Alkhatib said,

"I ask the regime to send Farouq al-Shara - if it accepts the idea - and we can sit with him,"

The leader of the Syrian opposition has met with both the Russian and Iranian Foreign Ministers, long-term allies of President Assad's regime, for the first time, as the conflict in Syria continues.

Moaz al-Khatib, leader of the Syrian National Coalition, widely recognised as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people, also met with US Vice President Joe Biden at Munich, Germany, where a global security conference was being held.

The Syrian opposition are to meet officials from the US and Russia on Saturday together in order to discuss political transition reports Reuters.

According to sources in the opposition, the Coalition president, Moaz Alkhatib, is to meet the US Vice President Joe Biden, the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and the UN envoy Lakhdhar Brahimi at the sidelines of a conference on security and cooperation in Munich.

Reuters have quoted the source as saying:

Farc rebels have killed three policemen in Maicao in the north of Colombia, officials say.

Violence has escalated since the end of a unilateral ceasefire by the rebels, which was not reciprocated by the Colombian government.

Bogota claims that 6 Farc members, including senior commander Jacob Arango, were killed in army operations on Thursday.

"It's a strike of great importance," Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzon told Reuters news agency.

A three member human rights panel called on Israel to halt further settlement expansion, warning that it could be subject to prosecution as potential war crimes.

In a report the panel argued that the settlements were against the Fourth Geneva Convention which forbids the resettlement of civilian populations into occupied territory, and were "leading to a creeping annexation that prevents the establishment of a contiguous and viable Palestinian state and undermines the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination,"

Palestian officials are to commence voter registration in the Gaza strip next month, allowing for elections.

The move comes following talks brokered by Egypt, where Hamas and Fatah agreed that voter registration would be a first step towards a national unity government.

The Palestinian Central Election Commission (CEC) was previously banned from Gaza by Hamas.

The CEC chairman Hanna Naser said:

Germany has reopened an inquiry into a massacre by SS soldiers in a village in France.

The troops killed 642 civilians in Oradour-sur-Glane, a village in occupied France, in June 1944.

60 soldiers stood trial in the 1950s, but all of the 20 convicted were later released.

Stasi files have now shown that around 6 former soldiers, who were aged 18 or 19 at the time, are still alive. Germany has sent investigators to the village to take witness testimonies.