The United States hailed the performance of Lebanon's banking sector describing it as “having a respect for the standards of international sanctions,” al-Akhbar daily quoted unnamed sources on Thursday.

The U.S. State Department conveyed a letter to Beirut assuring that Washington will not lay a finger on Lebanon's banking sector, the sources said on condition of anonymity.

The international community must be ready to use military action in response to any chemical weapons use by the Syrian regime, Israel's deputy foreign minister said on Friday.

"From the moment the international community understands that red lines have been crossed and that chemical weapons have been used, they will realize there's no other choice than to react (militarily)," Zeev Elkin told Israeli army radio.

The United States has withdrawn a demand that the United Nations start human rights investigations in disputed Western Sahara following furious lobbying by Morocco, diplomats said Tuesday.

Morocco, which has occupied Western Sahara since the 1970s, had condemned a U.S. move to put the demand in a U.N. Security Council resolution on the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the North African territory to be voted on Thursday.

The White House said Monday it was appalled by "horrific" reports of a new massacre in Syria after a watchdog group said over 100 people, many of them civilians, were killed in a town near Damascus.

"We are appalled by horrific reports that hundreds of Syrians were killed over the weekend in a Damascus suburb," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

U.S. intelligence agencies are investigating accounts from European allies that Syria may have used chemical weapons in its war against opposition forces, a senior U.S. official said Thursday.

There were indications a "deeply suspicious" agent may have been used in recent battles in Syria but spy services were still evaluating the information and had not reached a definitive conclusion, the official told Agence France Presse.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday welcomed a US decision to delay the test of an international ballistic missile to avoid stoking tensions with North Korea.

"I think the United States took a very important step in delaying the test of a ballistic missile," he told reporters at an industrial fair in Germany, speaking through an interpreter.

The United States on Friday expressed concern about a rise in sexual violence and gang rapes in Egypt and condemned local politicians who have said the women are to blame.

The response came after a string of reports by Agence France Presse and other media outlets about women who are speaking out about rape and other sexual attacks inflicted by groups of men at demonstrations in the wake of the 2011 uprising.

The United States is hoping to forge better ties with Venezuela once the political upheaval caused by president Hugo Chavez's death is over, but admitted Wednesday it may take some time.

"All of us know that electoral campaigns may not always be the best time to break new ground on policy," a senior State Department official, who asked not to be named, told reporters on a conference call.

A massive winter storm pounding the northern United States Tuesday grounded 2,600 flights, closed hundreds of schools and made roadways and highways impassible.

At least four people were reportedly killed in accidents on icy and snow covered roads and highways.

The United States and China on Tuesday called on the U.N. Security Council to sanction North Korean diplomats and "illicit" cash transfers to step up pressure on Pyongyang's nuclear program.

But the isolated North fueled tensions, threatening to scrap an armistice that halted the 1950-53 Korean War and warning that it could launch "strong" counter-measures against what it called U.S. hostility.