The United Nations has launched the biggest aid appeal in its history, calling for more than $7.9 billion to be dedicated to the crisis in Syria.

The United Nations has said it will need nearly $13 billion in aid in 2014 to reach at least 52 million people in 17 countries, including the millions of Syrians who have been displaced by their civil war.

A Paris-bound flight was rescheduled after Venezuela grounded an Air France plane that French authorities said terrorists might have been planning to blow up.

New Zealanders are fighting against the Assad regime in Syria and could pose a serious terror risk when they return home, it has been reported.

Cranes are lifting trailers into place and tents are being packed away as international aid workers rush to winterise a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan - trying to avoid a repeat of last year.

At this sprawling desert camp in Jordan, home to thousands of children who fled Syria's civil war, a few found a moment to smile over the weekend while watching a troop of clowns.

Professor William Harris sips his cup of tea in a small cafe in southern Turkey and recounts meeting Yasser Arafat, the former leader of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation.

Israeli warplanes attacks shipment of Russian missiles inside Syrian government stronghold, a development that threatens to add another volatile layer to tensions.

Syria has completed the destruction of equipment used to produce chemical weapons, a global watchdog has said, meeting another deadline in an ambitious timeline to eliminate the country's entire stockpile by mid-2014.

The UN has confirmed an outbreak of polio in Syria for the first time in over a decade, warning the disease threatens to spread among an estimated half-million children who have never been immunised because of the civil war.

"Of course there is hatred in my heart," a Syrian father tells Newstalk ZB host Rachel Smalley. "They destroyed my home, my dream, my life."

He's practically a one man band, but Rami Abdurrahman's influence extends far beyond his modest home in this small English city.

Amid all the bloodshed, confusion and deadlock of Syria's civil war, one fact is emerging after 2 1/2 years - no conflict ever has been covered this way.

The US has urged the Syrian Government to allow immediate aid convoys to starving civilians cut off in rebel-held suburbs of Damascus.

A tweet that appeared to suggest Israel had attacked Syria sent US oil prices soaring - until traders realised the post referred to the 40th anniversary of a war.

Former APNZ reporter Kate Shuttleworth spoke to Syrian evacuees in Jordan about their daily dilemma.

The 11-year-old's singed hair is matted with dirt and blood.

Syria's foreign minister has claimed that his government is fighting a war against al-Qaeda-linked militants who eat human hearts and dismember people while they are still alive, then send their limbs to family members.

Inspectors charged with the enormous task of overseeing the destruction of Syria's deadly chemical weapons stockpiles have kicked off their mission, racing to meet tight deadlines against the backdrop of civil war.

Prime Minister John Key says a draft Security Council resolution on Syria does not go far enough in ensuring the Syrian regime is held to account.

Rachel Smalley went to Syria with the help of World Vision and saw the impact of the country's refugee crisis through the eyes of a 14-year-old girl.

The five permanent members of the often-divided UN Security Council have reached agreement on a resolution to eliminate Syria's chemical weapons arsenal.

The UN Security Council, long paralysed by deep divisions over how to deal with the Syrian conflict, is about two days away from agreeing on a resolution to require Damascus to dismantle its chemical weapons stockpiles.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said yesterday that he could not be sure attempts to persuade Syria to surrender its chemical weapons would succeed.