EU awaiting outcome of Kerry-Lavrov meeting on Syria

The European Union Thursday said it is "wathcing very carefully what happens in Geneva," where US Secretary of State John Kerry is to meet his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov later today to discuss Moscow's proposal on Syria's chemical weapons. "The EU supports plans to put Syria's chemical weapons under international supervision and destroy them," Michael Mann, spokesman for EU High Reprresentative Catherine Ashton, told a news conference in Brussels. "The planned UN Security Council resolution should ensure effective implementation of this goal. We are already from the EU side analysing possible ways in which the plans could be implemented and identifying potential EU contributions," he noted. "We will consider which options to put forward based on the next developments and that of course the outcome of the Lavrov-Kerry meeting," said Mann. The spokesman stressed that "the plans on chemical weapons will by themselves not bring about a change on the situation on the ground in Syria." "We will continue to remind the Security Council of its responsibility to address the continuing blockage on the core issue of bringing about an end to the conflict," he said.