Syrian state television is claiming that Mohammad al-Golani, a leader in the Islamist rebel group the al-Nusra Front has been killed. There has been no independent verification of the report and an official Syrian news agency later withdrew a similar claim. The radical Islamist organization has been seen as one of the most powerful rebel groups in Syria.

The medical charity MSF says the more than 130,000 Syrians have fled heavy bombing in the northern Al Safira district in the past 2 weeks. They have been forced to flee to areas that are already struggling to cope with the huge influx of displaced people. MSF says humanitarian aid is insufficient and medical establishments are often being targeted. In New York, the United Nations Humanitarian Chief, Valerie Amos has told the Security Council that about 2.5 million Syrians were trapped beyond the reach of aid workers and that action was urgently required.

This is a race against time. As we deliberate, people continue to die unnecessarily. I call upon all members of the council to exert influence and take the necessary action to stop this brutality and violence.

World News from the BBC.

Hundreds of Eritrean refugees have held a mock funeral outside the Italian parliament to remember the victims of a ship wreck earlier this month. More than 350 people, most of them from Eritrea, drowned when their boat sank near the Italian island of Lampedusa. Italy's Prime Minister Enrico Letta has pressed fellow European leaders to give more help to Mediterranean countries to address the issue of illegal migration. But the EU pushed further discussion of the problem back to following summits.