A high-ranking Syrian official has welcomed the U.S.-Russian agreement to secure and destroy Syria's chemical weapons arsenal, calling it a "victory" for Damascus.
The comments Sunday from Minister of National Reconciliation Ali Haidar to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti are the first by a senior Syrian government official on the deal struck a day earlier in Geneva.
RIA Novosti quoted Haidar as saying the agreement "will help Syrians get out of the crisis" and also "averted a war against Syria by removing the pretext for those who wanted to unleash one."
This as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry assured Israel publicly the deal he reached with Russia's foreign minister on Syria's chemical weapons was capable of removing its deadly arsenal.
Speaking to reporters after briefing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the framework accord reached in Geneva on Saturday, Kerry said it "has the full ability ... to strip all of the chemical weapons from Syria".
Kerry said Russia had stated that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime had agreed to give an accounting of its chemical arsenal within a week.
For his part, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
said that Israel hoped a US-Russian deal to remove Syria's chemical
weapons would result in the "complete destruction" of the arsenal.
"We hope the understandings reached
between the United States and Russia regarding the Syrian chemical weapons will
yield results," he said in a speech at a memorial ceremony for Israeli
soldiers killed in the 1973 Middle East war.
"These understandings will be judged
by their result - the complete destruction of all of the chemical weapons
stockpiles that the Syrian regime has used against its own people," he
said.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Sunday
that he welcomed a deal reached by the United States and Russia to eliminate
Syria's chemical weapons arsenal.
"We believe that this framework
agreement has ameliorated the present explosive and tense situation in
Syria," Wang told visiting French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius.
For his part, French President Francois Hollande said a U.N. resolution framing the Russia-U.S. deal on removing Syria's chemical weapons must include the threat of some kind of sanction in the event that Syria does not comply with the accord.
Speaking on French prime-time television, Hollande said resolution could be voted by the end of the week. He added that a political and diplomatic solution to the wider Syrian conflict was possible but stressed that the option of military strikes must remain on the table.
This as French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius
said a Russia-US deal to remove Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's chemical
weapons was an important first step and called for a political solution to
address the mounting death toll in Syria.
Fabius made the comments to reporters in
Beijing after meeting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
In turn, Iran's speaker of parliament was
quoted as saying by Iranian media on Sunday that a deal between Russia and the
United States to remove Syria's chemical arsenal was a sign of US
"rationality".
Iran strongly backs Assad against the
rebels seeking to oust him, and has said the rebels were responsible for a
chemical attack last month outside of Damascus. The United States and its
allies say Assad's government is responsible.
Speaker Ali Larijani said in a news conference
late on Saturday that any US strike in retaliation for the gas attack would
result in a larger conflict in the region and would be against international
law, and that US policymakers had realized this.
"We are hopeful that American
politicians have some rationality so they avoid extremist behavior, and the
events of the last few days and the decisions that have been taken indicate
this rationality," Larijani said, according to the ISNA news agency on
Sunday.
Obama Interview:
President Barack Obama rejected Russian President Vladimir Putin's claim that Syrian rebels were responsible for an Aug. 21 chemical gas attack but, in an interview broadcast on Sunday, he welcomed Putin's diplomatic role in the crisis.
Obama, in an interview on ABC's "This Week With George Stephanopolous," defended his handling of the Syria crisis and dismissed criticism of his zig-zag approach to the issue as an argument about style.
Obama also said he and new Iranian President Hassan Rouhani had exchanged letters about the situation in Syria and that the Iranians understand the U.S. concern about a potential nuclear-armed Iran "is a far larger issue" for the United States.
Obama and Putin have become unlikely allies on Syria after U.S. threats to launch a military strike against Syria over the chemical weapons attack prompted a diplomatic initiative that has led to a framework deal on Saturday aimed at gaining control of Syria's poison gas stockpiles.
Obama said he welcomed Putin's involvement as helpful and said any deal on Syria must include a verifiable way to ensure that it gives up all its chemical weapons capacity.
"I think there's a way for Mr. Putin, despite me and him having a whole lot of differences, to play an important role in that," Obama said. "And so I welcome him being involved. I welcome him saying, 'I will take responsibility for pushing my client, the Assad regime, to deal with these chemical weapons.'"
But Obama dismissed Putin's charge that it was the Syrian rebels who launched the chemical weapons attack, instead of forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, as Washington believes.
"Well, nobody around the world takes seriously the idea that the rebels were the perpetrators of this," Obama said.
Washington says the attacked killed more than 1,400 civilians.
Obama's response to the crisis in Syria has received mixed reviews from the American people. A Reuters-Ipsos poll last week found only 35 percent of Americans were satisfied with how he was handling the situation.
He also has come under criticism from some lawmakers and many analysts for a bumpy approach to the crisis by first threatening a unilateral military strike, then suddenly asking Congress to authorize it, then asking Congress to postpone the vote to give diplomacy a chance.
In the ABC interview, Obama defended his approach, saying the steps he has taken had led to a situation where Syria has acknowledged it has chemical weapons and that its key ally, Russia, is pressuring Syria to give them up.
"I think that folks here in Washington like to grade on style," Obama said. "And so had we rolled out something that was very smooth and disciplined and linear, they would have graded it well, even if it was a disastrous policy."
Obama did not reveal details of his exchange of letters with Iran's Rouhani but made clear that U.S. concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions are paramount.
Obama said he doubted Rouhani would "suddenly make it easy" to negotiate with and said the United States would keep up the pressure for Tehran to give up a nuclear program that Iran denies is aimed at building an atomic weapon.
"My view is that if you have both a credible threat of force, combined with a rigorous diplomatic effort, that, in fact you can strike a deal," he said.
REUTERS
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