China, Russia to help Syria arms removal

Russia and China are to dispatch warships in an effort to help safeguard the mission of eliminating Syria’s chemical weapons.

On Thursday, Maj. Eystein Kvarving, a spokesman for the joint Danish-Norwegian operation tasked with transporting Syria’s chemical weapons out of the country, said Russian and Chinese warships would provide additional security to the mission.

According to Kvarving, the Russian missile cruiser, Peter the Great, and a Chinese ship, identified by China’s Defense Ministry as Yan Cheng, will not operate under the Danish-Norwegian command, but they will be in close contact.

The official added that Nordic vessels will set sail from the port of Limassol in Cyprus to the Syrian coast on Friday. The mission will remain standby there until they receive orders on when they can head to the Syrian port of Latakia and pick up the chemical stockpile.

In late December 2013, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said the removal of Syria’s chemical toxins will likely miss a December 31 deadline due to “various external influences.”

On September 27, the UN Security Council approved a resolution supporting a Russia-US deal to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons by mid-2014. The deal was reached after Moscow offered Syria to place its chemical weapons arsenal under international supervision and Damascus accepted the proposal.

The resolution prevented a US military strike on Syria under the baseless pretext that the Syrian government had been behind a fatal chemical attack on the outskirts of Damascus on August 21. Damascus strongly rejected the allegation.

MKA/HSN

Source Article from http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/01/03/343453/china-russia-to-help-syria-arms-removal/

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