Jeddah: Jeddah
A Russian proposal under which Syria has agreed to surrender its chemical weapons to international supervision will not end the bloodshed in the war-torn country, Gulf states said yesterday.
“We’ve heard of the initiative ... It’s all about chemical weapons but doesn’t stop the spilling of the blood of the Syrian people,” Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Shaikh Khaled Al Khalifa, whose country is the current president of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, told a news conference in Jeddah.
“The issue is not about one type of weapon... We are tired of procrastination and delay,” he said.
“We want an end to the suffering of the Syrian people,” he added. In an address at the start of the meeting, Khalifa called for “appropriate deterrent measures against those who committed this crime” and said the chemical attack required “the United Nations and the international community, represented by the Security Council, to shoulder its responsibility”.
Syria said yesterday it has accepted the Russian proposal to hand over its chemical weapons to avert threatened US military strikes over Damascus’ alleged use of internationally banned arms against rebel strongholds, killing hundreds of people. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov unexpectedly raised the proposal on Monday after meeting his Syrian counterpart Walid Al Muallem, setting off a flurry of diplomatic activity as world leaders scrambled to respond to the gesture.
— AFP, Reuters
