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Syria hands over details of weapons
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Syria has begun supplying details of its chemical arsenal, the world’s chemical weapons watchdog said yesterday.
A senior official also said Damascus wanted a cease-fire in the 30-month war, which has reportedly killed more than 110,000 people and forced more than 2 million to flee.
Iranian President Hassan Rowhani has offered to broker talks between the Syrian opposition and the Islamic republic’s key ally in Damascus.
Hours before a deadline for President Bashar al-Assad’s government to provide details on its arsenal, the Hague-based group tasked with dismantling it said it had received an initial report.
“The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has received an initial disclosure from the Syrian government of its chemical weapons program,” an OPCW statement said.
Its Technical Secretariat is now examining the details, it said.
The organization has postponed a meeting of its Executive Council set for tomorrow that had been due to discuss how to dismantle Syria’s chemical weapons program.
Damascus had until today to supply details of its arsenal, in line with a US-Russian plan that helped prevent US military action on government targets following a chemical attack last month that killed hundreds of people.
The plan stipulates that Assad’s government hand over its chemical weapons and facilities, which would be destroyed by mid-2014.
But on Wednesday, Assad said in an interview that the task could take at least a year and cost a billion dollars.
Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil, meanwhile, said the war is now in stalemate and Damascus would call for a cease-fire if long-delayed peace talks in Geneva take place.
“Neither the armed opposition nor the regime is capable of defeating the other side,” Jamil told Britain’s Guardian newspaper.
Asked what his government would propose at the stalled Geneva II summit, he replied: “An end to external intervention, a cease-fire and the launching of a peaceful political process.”
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