115 Irish soldiers are due to travel to Syria in the middle of next month, to join a UN observer mission.

They'll be deployed in the Golan Heights region, which is the zone of seperation between Syria and Israel.

A defence forces spokesperson has said this area is not in the middle of civil war conflict, which has escalated sharply in the last week.

However, Commandant Denis Hanly of the Irish Defence Forces told presenter Fionn Davenport on Newstalk's Tom Dunne (yesterday) show that Irish troops serving abroad are continuously trained in how to deal with chemical warfare:

According to Commandant Hanly, "It's actually one of the central parts of a soldier's basic training, the CBRN drills, Chemical Biological Radialogical and Nuclear, and we train for all that. And we have top class individual protection equipment from respirators, gas masks, suits, gloves, decontamination equipment. We would do a test on a respirator every year.

The troops themselves will go out initially for a 6-month tour of duty, and then depending on government decision we will rotate as neccessary, and also the request from the UN."

The Irish Army is preparing its troops for deployment as the UK says it is considering military intervention in Syria. The US and its allies are also 'evaluating' their best response.