Kerry admits Assad improved position on the ground in Syria

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The head of an international chemical weapons mission in Syria said on Thursday she does not believe the Syrian government is deliberately delaying the transfer of its chemical arsenal abroad.

"No I don't think so," Sigrid Kaag told reporters when asked if the Syrian government may be deliberately stalling. "Delays are not insurmountable. Delays have a reason, there's a rationale, there's a context."

Kaag briefed the U.N. Security Council behind closed doors on Thursday. The U.N. Security Council called on Syria "to expedite actions to meet its obligation to transport in a systematic and sufficiently accelerated manner all relevant chemicals to Latakia for removal from Syrian territory."

"With deadline on the horizon, it is essential that Syria accelerates" shipments of toxic chemicals out of the country, Kaag told a closed-door briefing of the 15-nation Security Council, a diplomat attending told Reuters on condition of anonymity. "Time for action is now."

On another note, US Secretary of State John Kerry made a rare admission that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has registered a remarkable improvement on the ground.

"It's fair to say that Assad has improved his position, but he is still not winning. This is a stalemate,” Kerry said in an exclusive interview with CNN's "The Lead with Jake Tapper. “

But Kerry denied that Obama administration’s the policy is failing.

“And we are always in the process of reevaluating whether there's more we can do, should do. We'll work with Congress. We're working internally to figure out if we should if there's a way to get more response from the Russians, more response from Assad," he added.

Meanwhile, the governor of Homs said a deal was reached with the United Nations to evacuate civilians from the besieged old city, where forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are surrounding rebel-held areas, Syrian state media reported.

This comes as, the Russian Foreign Ministry said the Syrian government and rebels fighting to oust President Bashar al-Assad appear to have reached an agreement on allowing humanitarian aid to reach the besieged city of Homs.

For his part, Russia's United Nations ambassador said Moscow is against a UN Security Council resolution that would push for greater humanitarian access to Syria to deliver desperately needed aid.

Vitaly Churkin told a press briefing Wednesday that "hard, pragmatic and purposeful work is necessary" to resolve specific humanitarian issues not a new council resolution which will almost certainly aim "to politicize the problem."

AP/LBCI/REUTERS