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Syrian chemical weapons agreement bound for United Nations Security Council

(CBS)  The U.S. and Russia shook hands on a groundbreaking framework agreement Saturday to identify Syria’s chemical weapons, place them under control of ...
Syria

(CBS)  The U.S. and Russia shook hands on a groundbreaking framework agreement Saturday to identify Syria’s chemical weapons, place them under control of the Chemical Weapons Convention and its compliance body, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, and to ultimately dismantle them.

“The world will now expect the Assad regime to live up to its public commitments,” U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said.

The agreement between Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was a breakthrough and a relief to both the U.S. and Russia.

There has been a clear shift represented in the Geneva framework: Russia has agreed to put forward an enforceable U.N. Security Council resolution and to include a provision that envisions further measures in the event of non-compliance by Syria.

Negotiations will now turn to U.N. ambassadors, and Kerry indicated on Saturday that the U.S. has agreed to not have a use-of-force trigger in the U.N. resolution, but he will seek one if Syrian President Bashar Assad does not follow through.

“There is nothing said about the use of force and not about any automatic sanctions,” Lavrov said Saturday.

A diplomat involved in the negotiations said there are ways to forge a compromise.

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