Ban welcomes Russia-US deal on Syria's chemical weapons

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed hope on Saturday that the agreement reached by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and United States Secretary of State John Kerry on placing Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles under international control would enable a political and diplomatic solution to the Syrian issue. In a press release by spokesperson of the UN Secretary General in New York, UN chief welcomed the news that Russia and the United States reached an agreement on a framework for Syria to destroy all of its chemical weapons arsenal. The UN statement went on to say that Ban looked forward to learning more of the framework agreed by Russia and the United States and pledged the support of the United Nations in its implementation. “The Secretary-General expresses his fervent hope that the agreement will, first, prevent any future use of chemical weapons in Syria and, second, help pave the path for a political solution to stop the appalling suffering inflicted on the Syrian people,” said the statement. Announcement of the deal came after three days of intense talks in Geneva, Switzerland, between Lavrov and Kerry which culminated a week of diplomatic activity, kicked off by the earlier announcement of Russia's proposal for Damascus to surrender its chemical weapons and place them under international control. The Russia-US deal aimed at complete destruction of Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles until mid-2014, as Kerry stressed earlier. UN spokesperson confirmed on Thursday that the UN chief had received a letter from the Syrian government informing him that President Bassar Al-Assad would sign and abide by the 1992 Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction. Meanwhile, evidence collected by a UN chemical weapons inspectors team probing possible chemical weapons use in Syria on 21 August is still under examination by laboratories in Europe, and is expected to be submitted to him in due course.