The United Nations Security Council unanimously passed on Friday a resolution ordering the destruction of Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons.
The United Nations Security Council unanimously passed on Friday a resolution ordering the destruction of Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons, overcoming prolonged deadlock to approve the first council resolution on the conflict in the Arab country, which is now 30 months old.
UN leader Ban Ki-moon, who called the resolution "the first hopeful news on Syria in a long time," said he hopes to convene a peace conference in mid-November.
Resolution 2118, the result of bruising negotiations between the United States and Russia, gives international binding force to a plan drawn up by the two to eliminate Damascus’ chemical arms.
The plan calls for Syria's estimated 1,000 tons of chemical weapons to be put under international control by mid-2014. Experts say the timetable is very tight.
The resolution also "condemns in the strongest terms any use of chemical weapons in the Syrian Arab Republic, in particular the attack on August 21, 2013, in violation of international law."
International experts are expected to start work in Syria next week. Britain and China announced that they will offer finance to the disarmament operation.
Commenting on the resolution, US Secretary of State John Kerry hailed it as saying: "The Security Council has shown that when we put aside politics for the common good, we are still capable of doing big things."
But he warned: "Should the regime fail to act, there will be consequences.”
For his part, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stressed that there were no automatic punitive measures, and that the resolution applied equally to the Syrian opposition.
He said the council would take "actions which are commensurate with the violations, which will have to proven 100 percent."
Russia, the Syrian government’s main ally, has rejected any suggestion of sanctions or military force against Damascus. It has already used its veto power as a permanent Security Council member to block three Western-drafted resolutions on Syria.
