Syria has shipped out or destroyed around 80 per cent of its declared chemical weapons material, the top international disarmament inspector said at the weekend.

Sigrid Kaag said that if the present momentum was sustained, Syria should be able to meet its April 27 deadline to hand over all declared chemical agents.

Ms Kaag is the special co-ordinator of the joint mission of the United Nations and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

“The renewed pace in movement is positive and necessary to ensure progress towards a tight deadline,” Ms Kaag said.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad agreed with the United States and Russia to dispose of the chemical weapons after hundreds of people were killed in a sarin gas attack on the outskirts of the capital last August.

Washington claimed that it had been Mr Assad’s forces who unleashed the nerve agent, but the government blamed rebels.