Syria's Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem declared on Tuesday
that in addition to publicly acknowledging its chemical weapons
stockpiles, Syria will also formally sign the international convention
against such weapons, fully comply with a Russian proposal that would
place its arsenal under international control, and vow to foreswear any
future development of similar arms.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem speaks to the media in Moscow,
Monday, Sept. 9, 2013. Syria's foreign minister said his country
welcomes Russia's proposal for it to place its chemical weapons under
international control and then dismantle them quickly to avert U.S.
strikes. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)
In
a day of rapid developments
over the issue, Syria—whose President Bashar al-Assad has up until now
repeatedly refused to even admit that Syria actually possessed such
weapons—has pivoted sharply in the last twenty-four hours following
Russia's offer to help broker a deal at the UN that could help avert a
military attack by U.S. military forces.
Despite what appears on the surface as a rather dramatic capitulation
to US and Western demands, Secretary of State John Kerry responded
immediately to Syria's announcement by saying that the
move was not enough and that Syria would need to "do more" to prove itself before war could be ruled out.
The new prospect of such a deal, however, remained stuck after its first round of discussion at the U.N. Tuesday.
According to
Al-Jazeera,
"The main sticking point was that France wanted to invoke Chapter Seven
of the UN Charter, making any resolution legally binding and
enforceable by military action."
As the
Associated Press reports:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said the plan can only work if "the
American side and those who support the U.S.A, in this sense, reject the
use of force."
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told his French counterpart
Laurent Fabius that it is unacceptable for the resolution to cite
Chapter 7, his ministry said in a statement.
Secretary of State John Kerry, in turn, said the U.S. rejects a
Russian suggestion that the U.N. endorsement come in the form of a
non-binding statement from the Security Council president.
The U.S. has to have a full resolution — one that entails
"consequences if games are played and somebody tries to undermine this,"
he said.
Amid all this, President Obama is scheduled to speak to the nation in a televised address
Tuesday night at 9:00 pm EST.
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