Syria chemical weapons: US, Russia strike landmark deal

Both countries warn that Assad will have to comply or else face UN Security Council sanctions.

GENEVA:

The United States and Russia on Saturday agreed on an ambitious plan to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons by the middle of next year and left the door open to sanctions if Damascus failed to comply.

The deal was hailed by the West, but rejected by rebels who warn that it would not halt the bloodshed in the conflict which has spanned over the last two and a half years.

Under the accord drawn up after the three-day talks between US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, Syrian President Bashar al Assad now has a week to hand over details of his regime’s stockpile.

Russia has warned that the UN Security Council would act if Syria breached the international convention banning chemical weapons under a deal reached with the United States to eliminate its arms stockpile.

“In the case of those demands not being fulfilled, or in the case of anyone using chemical weapons, the Security Council will take measures according to Chapter Seven of the United Nations charter,” Lavrov said at a joint press conference with US Secretary of State John Kerry.

Lavrov said that the Security Council expects Syria to comply fully with the demands of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

Meanwhile, Kerry said Assad’s regime must also provide “immediate and unfettered” access to inspectors of OPCW.

“The inspectors must be on the ground no later than November... and the goal is to establish the removal by halfway through next year,” said Kerry.

US President Barack Obama meanwhile said “the United States remains prepared to act” if Damascus failed to comply.

“While we have made important progress, much more work remains to be done,” Obama said.

Echoing Obama’s warning, Kerry said that there must be “no games, no room for avoidance of anything less than full compliance by the Assad regime”.

Kerry said the steps agreed on Saturday would be encapsulated in a UN Security Council resolution drawn up under Chapter Seven of the organisation’s charter, which provides for enforcement through sanctions including the possible use of military force.

But with Russia strongly opposed to the use of military threats against its long-term ally, and wielding a veto on the Security Council, Kerry acknowledged it was “impossible to have a pre-agreement” on what would happen in the event of non-compliance.

Kerry said that Syria’s bloody civil war could only be ended through negotiations, which was another nod to Russia’s opposition to military intervention.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 15^th, 2013.