Ninety-six percent of Syria’s declared chemical weapons destroyed (UN-OPCW mission chief)

 UN, 4 September 2014 – The Special Coordinator for the Joint Mission of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the United Nations (OPCW-UN) told the Security Council today that 96 percent of Syria’s declared stockpile, including the most dangerous chemicals, had been destroyed and preparation were underway to destroy the remaining 12 production facilities.

“This is a chemical weapons disarmament process, it’s been unique,” said Sigrid Kaag after her final briefing to the Security Council in her capacity as the head of the joint mission dealing with Syria’s chemical weapons, which is winding up its work at the end of September.

“At the same time, we reiterate our strong hope that if this is achieved, that conditions for peace and security and the political process will be centre stage for the benefit of the people of Syria and that of the region, particularly in these days of profound crisis.”

Ms. Kaag told a press conference at UN Headquarters following her closed-door briefing to the Council that the mission had overseen that destruction of 100 percent of “priority chemicals” and 96 percent of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile, but the good offices of the UN Secretary-General on this issue, discussions on monitoring verification, and accurate reporting to the Council will be continued.

She said starting October 1, the OPCW will be in the lead – in partnership with the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNPOS) to begin destroying the 12 remaining chemical weapons facilities – seven so-called hangars and five tunnels.

“All in all, the joint mission has achieved its objectives, has assisted the authorities in Damascus to achieve their goals as a State party, but the residual activities that remain of course are also of importance and interest to the [Security] Council so they have been asked to be briefed on a regular basis as before for a foreseeable period,” Ms. Kaag said.

The Security Council President for September, United States Ambassador Samantha Power, told reporters after the meeting, the Council’s interest in the issue of ridding Syria of chemical weapons will not abate as “Council members noted that the elimination effort is not complete.”

Ms. Power also said some Security Council members raised their concerns about the Syrian Government’s use of chlorine gas, as reported by the UN Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry last month.

In response to a question, the Security Council President said Security Council resolution 2118 (2013) has not yet been fulfilled, “and it won’t be fulfilled until this Council has confidence that the terms of the chemical weapons convention has been met.” In that resolution, the Council endorsed the expeditious destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons programme, with inspections to begin by 1 October, and agreed that in the event of non-compliance, it would impose “Chapter VII” measures.

The removal of the most critical material for destruction began in early January, in line with an agreement brokered by Russia and the United States, by which Syria renounced its chemical weapons material and joined 1992 Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons.
[un.org]
4/9/14
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Related:

• Syria's worst chemical arms neutralized: Pentagon

• Progress made on destruction of chemical weapons outside Syria (UNSC president)

• All toxic chemicals removed from Syria now at destruction sites (OPCW)

• US ship begins neutralizing Syrian chemical weapons 

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• Ευάγγελος Βενιζέλος: Απόλυτη προστασία του μεσογειακού θαλάσσιου περιβάλλοντος, σε σχέση με την επιχείρηση καταστροφής του οπλοστασίου χημικών όπλων της Συρίας.

• Απάντηση ΥΦΥΠΕΞ Κ. Γεροντόπουλου σε επίκαιρη ερώτηση του βουλευτή κ. Νότη Μαριά (ΑΝ.ΕΛ) για την καταστροφή των χημικών της Συρίας. -Ελληνικό ΥΠΕΞ

Syria's worst chemical arms neutralized: Pentagon

WASHINGTON: A specially equipped US ship has finished neutralizing all 600 metric tonnes of the most dangerous of Syria's chemical weapons components surrendered to the international community this year to avert threatened air strikes, the Pentagon said on Monday.

It said the Cape Ray, equipped with the US-developed Field Deployable Hydrolysis System, neutralized 581.5 metric tonnes of DF, a sarin precursor chemical, and 19.8 metric tonnes of HD, an ingredient of sulfur mustard, while afloat in the Mediterranean.

The vessel will travel to Finland and Germany in the next two weeks to unload the resulting effluent, which will undergo treatment as industrial waste to render it safer, a Pentagon spokeswoman said.

It was the first time chemical weapons components had been neutralized at sea, the Pentagon said.

Damascus agreed, last September, to a Russian proposal to give up its chemical weapons to avert threatened military strikes by the United States and France, which accused Syria of using the arms against opponents of President Bashar al-Assad.

A number of countries are involved in eliminating the chemical stockpiles. The United States was selected to dispose of the worst of the chemical weapons components because it had recently developed a mobile version of the hydrolysis system it uses for neutralizing chemical stockpiles.

The system uses substances and mixtures such as water, sodium hydroxide and sodium hypochlorite to neutralize bulk amounts of chemical warfare agents, according to the U.S. Army's Edgewood Chemical Biological Center.

Earlier this year, the hydrolysis system was placed aboard the Cape Ray, a 648-foot (198-meter) vessel that is part of the US Maritime Administration's ready reserve force of 46 ships.

The ship was held at Rota, Spain, for several months due to Syrian delays in handing over its declared stockpiles of chemical agents. The Cape Ray began neutralizing the chemicals after picking them up from Italy in late June. 
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/Syrias-worst-chemical-arms-neutralized-Pentagon/articleshow/40386254.cms
19/8/14
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Related:

• Progress made on destruction of chemical weapons outside Syria (UNSC president)

• All toxic chemicals removed from Syria now at destruction sites (OPCW)

• US ship begins neutralizing Syrian chemical weapons 

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• Ευάγγελος Βενιζέλος: Απόλυτη προστασία του μεσογειακού θαλάσσιου περιβάλλοντος, σε σχέση με την επιχείρηση καταστροφής του οπλοστασίου χημικών όπλων της Συρίας.

• Απάντηση ΥΦΥΠΕΞ Κ. Γεροντόπουλου σε επίκαιρη ερώτηση του βουλευτή κ. Νότη Μαριά (ΑΝ.ΕΛ) για την καταστροφή των χημικών της Συρίας. -Ελληνικό ΥΠΕΞ

Progress made on destruction of chemical weapons outside Syria (UNSC president)

There has been "good progress" on the destruction of Syria's chemical weapon materials outside the country, UK's Permanent Representative to the UN Mark Lyall Grant, who holds the rotating presidency of the Security Council for August, told reporters here on Tuesday.

Lyall Grant made the remarks after a briefing to the 15-member Council behind closed doors via video teleconference by Sigrid Kaag, special coordinator for the United Nations - Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Joint Mission.

Kaag reported to the Council on the work that has been taking place to destroy Syria's chemical weapons, which have now been completely taken out of that country.

"The United States briefed that they had completed about 60 percent now of treatment of Priority A chemicals on the ship, the Cape Ray and once that treatment is completed, then the effluent will be sent to Germany and Finland for final disposal," said Lyall Grant.

The UK would complete its destruction of the B precursors and hydrochloric acids in the course of this week. So, good progress on the destruction of chemicals outside Syria, he added.

The Security Council was also told about a meeting in Beirut on Tuesday to work out the modalities for the destruction of the 12 remaining declared production facilities that would take about six months to complete, according to the president.

Lyall Grant added that there would be a further visit by the OPCW team in September to the Syrian capital, Damascus.

On the future of the Joint Mission, he said, there was a "very clear majority view" that Syria remained a special case and the outstanding issues were such that the mission should continue for the time being.

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The UN Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution in September last year to rid the war-torn Middle East country of its chemical weapons. Under the resolution, the OPCW was mandated to oversee the elimination of Syria's chemical weapons materials.

The removal of the most critical material for destruction began in early January. As per the decisions taken by the Security Council and the OPCW Executive Council, the full arsenal of Syria's chemical weapons should be destroyed by June 30, 2014.

On June 23, the Joint Mission announced that Syria has removed all of its declared chemical arsenal from its territory.
Sources: Xinhua -globaltimes.cn
6/8/14
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Related:

• All toxic chemicals removed from Syria now at destruction sites (OPCW)

• US ship begins neutralizing Syrian chemical weapons 

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• Ευάγγελος Βενιζέλος: Απόλυτη προστασία του μεσογειακού θαλάσσιου περιβάλλοντος, σε σχέση με την επιχείρηση καταστροφής του οπλοστασίου χημικών όπλων της Συρίας.

• Απάντηση ΥΦΥΠΕΞ Κ. Γεροντόπουλου σε επίκαιρη ερώτηση του βουλευτή κ. Νότη Μαριά (ΑΝ.ΕΛ) για την καταστροφή των χημικών της Συρίας. -Ελληνικό ΥΠΕΞ

US ship begins neutralizing Syrian chemical weapons

US container ship Cape Ray began neutralizing chemical materials on Monday that were once part of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's weapons arsenal, the Pentagon said.
The ship, in international waters in the Mediterranean Sea, began processing about 600 metric tonnes of chemical weapons and raw materials that could be used in them, Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steve Warren told reporters.

The US government has said the materials include mustard gas and components for the nerve agent sarin.
[jpost.com]
7/7/14
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Related:

• Ευάγγελος Βενιζέλος: Απόλυτη προστασία του μεσογειακού θαλάσσιου περιβάλλοντος, σε σχέση με την επιχείρηση καταστροφής του οπλοστασίου χημικών όπλων της Συρίας.

• Απάντηση ΥΦΥΠΕΞ Κ. Γεροντόπουλου σε επίκαιρη ερώτηση του βουλευτή κ. Νότη Μαριά (ΑΝ.ΕΛ) για την καταστροφή των χημικών της Συρίας. -Ελληνικό ΥΠΕΞ

• ΥΠΕΞ: Ανακοίνωση Υπουργείου Εξωτερικών για την καταστροφή των χημικών όπλων της Συρίας

• Απάντηση ΥΦΥΠΕΞ Δ. Κούρκουλα σε Επίκαιρη Ερώτηση για Καταστροφή Χημικού Οπλοστασίου Συρίας. -Ελληνικό ΥΠΕΞ

 

Greece unhappy over Syrian chemical weapons destruction

MV Cape Ray

Greece has expressed concerns regarding the destruction of Syrian chemical weapons in the Mediterranean Sea the country’s Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos said Tuesday
Venizelos stated that Greece and its heavily populated island, Crete, have reservations and would “prefer those chemical gases to be destroyed out in the Atlantic Ocean.”

He added that if the destruction is to take place in the Mediterranean Sea, there should be guarantees regarding the effects on the environment and tourism and that the EU should monitor the process.

Last month thousands of Cretans protested against the destruction of Syrian chemicals off the coast of their island.

However, the U.S. ship MV Cape Ray is preparing to destroy more toxic substances from Syria after receiving the material at an Italian port. The ship while in the Mediterranean will destroy the dangerous substances via a process of hydrolysis, which will alter the chemicals so as to make them no longer dangerous. 
[aa.com.tr]
15/4/14
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Related:

• Παρέμβαση Αντ. της Κυβέρνησης και ΥΠΕΞ Ευ. Βενιζέλου για τη Συρία στο σημερινό ΣEY της ΕΕ (Λουξεμβούργο)

• Chemical waste worries Cretans. -Syrian chemical weapons arsenal to be destroyed in Mediterranean waters