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Security Council Agrees on Resolution to Rid Syria of Chemical Arms KEY NATIONS AT U.N. REACH AGREEMENT ON SYRIA WEAPONS
(about 3 hours later)
The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council have agreed on a resolution that will require Syria to give up its chemical weapons, but the text will not threaten the use of force for a failure to comply, officials said. UNITED NATIONS — The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council have agreed on a resolution that will require Syria to give up its chemical weapons, but there will be no automatic penalties if the Syrians fail to comply, officials said Thursday.
The office of the American ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, announced the deal. But the final version, which will be discussed by the full 15-member Security Council on Thursday night, was not written under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, the strongest form of a Council resolution because it can be enforced with military action. The agreement, hammered out after days of back room negotiations, represents a compromise between the United States, its allies, and Russia, which had refused to go along with any measure that imposed automatic penalties on Syria if it fails to obey.
That is a compromise with Russia, the Syrian government’s most powerful defender, which had said from the outset it would oppose a Chapter VII resolution, as it has repeatedly done throughout the divided Security Council’s efforts to forge a consensus on resolving the Syria conflict. But the deal, when finally approved by the 15 members of the Security Council, would amount to the most significant international diplomatic initiative of the Syrian civil war and a remarkable turn for President Obama who had been pushing for a military strike on Syria only to accept a Russian proposal to have Syria relinquish its chemical arsenal.
The final draft also does not ascribe specific blame for the Aug. 21 attack that asphyxiated hundreds of Syrians near Damascus, another compromise with the Russians, who have repeatedly said they believe Syrian insurgents carried it out. Western diplomats said the resolution would be legally binding and would stipulate that if Syria fails to abide the terms, the Security Council would take measures under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, the strongest form of a council resolution. Such measures could include economic sanctions or even military action. But before any action could be taken, the issue would have to go back for debate by Security Council, on which Russia, like the other permanent members, holds a veto.
Still, diplomats said, the final draft does express the Security Council’s “strong conviction” that those found responsible for chemical weapons use in the Syrian conflict should be held accountable. Before the Security Council votes on the measure, an organization in The Hague will have to determine procedures for ridding Syria of its chemical weapons. Samantha Power, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, said in a message on Twitter that the resolution established a “new norm” against the use of chemical weapons. Mark Lyall Grant, Britain’s ambassador to the United Nations, said in another post that the resolution agreed to by the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France would be “binding and enforceable.”
The draft resolution’s compliance provision is modeled along the agreement reached nearly two weeks ago by Russia and the United States that commits Syria to surrender its chemical weapons by the middle of 2014. In the event Syria fails to comply, the draft asserts, the Security Council would then reconvene to impose unspecified measures under Chapter VII. The diplomatic breakthrough on the Syria came as Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, said progress had been made toward a resolution of the nuclear dispute between his country and the West.
Diplomats said incomplete components of the resolution included precisely how Syria’s weapons stockpile would be destroyed, partly because the Security Council was still awaiting a document from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the group based in The Hague that monitors the Chemical Weapons Convention. But the Russians have said they would insist that the banned munitions must be destroyed inside Syria. The entire 15-member Security Council began to discuss the Syria resolution that was agreed to by the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China — the permanent members of the Security Council — on Thursday evening.
Russia Today, a government-run news Web site, quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov on Thursday as saying that Russian forces could be used in guarding chemical weapons facilities where dismantling and destruction work was carried out. He also suggested that other members of the Chemical Weapons Convention should “seriously consider the possibility of taking part in this process.” A vote on the resolution could come as early as Friday, the French Foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, told reporters here Thursday night, so long as the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, based in The Hague, votes on its own Syria measure early Friday. A formal vote on the measure will not take place until the international organization that monitors compliance with the international treaty banning chemical weapons drafts procedures for inspecting and eliminating Syria’s vast arsenal of poison gas.
The Syria resolution was a major milestones for the United Nations after years of largely unproductive discussions in the Security Council over the civil war in Syria, which has killed more than 100,000.
Just three weeks ago, the Obama administration grew openly frustrated at the inability to win Russian support for military action against the government of President Bashar al-Assad after a chemical weapons attack Aug. 21 that killed more than 1400 people. Ambassador Power complained then that “there is no viable path forward in this Security Council.”
Now, a key provision that of the resolution agreed to that “the use of chemical weapons anywhere constitutes a threat to international peace and security.”
Syria, the resolution states, “shall not use, develop, produce, otherwise acquire, stockpile or retain chemical weapons, or transfer, directly or indirectly, chemical weapons to other States or non-sate actors.”
The measure notes that “in the event of noncompliance with this resolution, including unauthorized transfer of chemical weapons, or any use of chemical weapons by anyone in the Syrian Arab Republic,” the Security Council can decided to “impose measures under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter.”
But while Western diplomats were hailing the new resolution as a breakthrough, much will depend on how it is ultimately implemented in a nation that is caught in a bloody, two-and-a- half-year civil war.
According to the resolution, the director general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the watchdog organization that polices the international treaty banning chemical weapons, or the secretary general of the United Nations would report any violations to the Security Council.
The Council would then discuss that measures to impose for Syria’s noncompliance.
American officials have said that they were pleasantly surprised by the completeness of the Syrian government’s declaration of its chemical weapons program, which was presented to the O.P.C.W. on Friday.
But far more formidable challenges lie ahead.
By November, international monitors are to inspect all of Syria’s declared sites, and equipment to produce and mix chemical weapons is to be destroyed, according to a “framework” agreement that was negotiated by the United States and Russia earlier this month and which is to be enforced by the new Security Council resolution.
Syria’s entire arsenal is to be eliminated by the middle of 2014, according to that accord, a process that Mr. Assad has said would take a year.
Skeptics worry that the process may become drawn out as it was during the 1990s when the United Nations sought to inspect and disbarment Saddam Hussein’s arsenal. Syrian compliance, they fear, may be only partial and the Russians, they worry, may use their veto power in the Security Council to buy the Assad government more time.
The diplomatic maneuvering over Syria came amid another drama at the United Nations
Mr. Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, emerged from a meeting with six world powers late Thursday afternoon and said, with a smile, that he had “very substantive, businesslike” talks on resolving nuclear impasse as American and European officials announced that negotiations on “details” would be hammered out in Geneva next month.
The meeting, led by the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, took place with the five permanent members of the Security Council, along with Germany.
Ms. Ashton said she envisioned an “ambitious timetable,” of next steps that would be discussed when the group meets in Geneva on Oct 15 and Oct. 16. The details, she said, would address what Iran needs to do, how soon, and how the international community can verify whether it is keeping its word. “Twelve months is a good time frame to think about implementation on the ground,” she said.
“It was a substantial meeting,” she told reporters here, “a good atmosphere, energetic.”
Her attempts in the past to negotiate a settlement with Iran, including a European proposal for a nuclear deal, had not been fruitful. She said Thursday that Iran could choose to respond to her last proposal or submit a new one. “
“The purpose of today was to set the tone and the framework,” she said.
Mr. Zarif said Iran hoped to reach a détente “in a timely fashion” that would preserve its right to enrich uranium and persuade the world community that it is for civilian use. “Now we see if we can match our positive words with serious deeds,” he said.
He said the “endgame” would be the lifting of all sanctions “within a short period of time.”

Somini Sengupta and Rick Gladstone contributed reporting.