Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has made fresh calls for a political solution for war-ravaged Syria amid claims of chemical weapons use.
Russia has announced it will establish a humanitarian corridor and implement a five-hour daily truce in Syria's eastern Ghouta, after a UN Security Council resolution demanded a 30-day ceasefire across the entire country.
Over the past week, Syria's army and its allies have subjected the rebel-held enclave of eastern Ghouta near Damascus to one of the heaviest bombardments of the seven-year war, killing hundreds.
Overnight, Australia took its place on the United Nations Human Rights Council.
"We joined in the condemnation... of the acts particularly in Ghouta," Ms Bishop told reporters in Canberra on Tuesday.
On Sunday, health authorities said several people had suffered symptoms consistent with chlorine gas exposure and on Monday rescue workers and a war monitor said seven small children were killed by air and artillery strikes in one town.
"It is absolutely abhorrent that chemical weapons should be used in any circumstance," Ms Bishop said.
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