(RIA Novosti) Obama “Welcomes” US-Russian Deal on Syria
MOSCOW, September 14 (RIA Novosti) – US President Barack Obama said Saturday that he “welcomes” the surprise deal Moscow and Washington reached on chemical weapons in war-ravaged Syria, but warned that the US will use military force if diplomacy fails.
The breakthrough agreement struck earlier Saturday came after weeks of intense diplomacy and an almost three-day-long marathon of talks in Geneva between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his US counterpart John Kerry.
Obama said in a statement that the agreement was an “important” step in bringing all chemical weapons in Syria under international control and destroying them by mid-2014.
“I welcome the progress made between the United States and Russia through our talks in Geneva, which represents an important, concrete step toward the goal of moving Syria's chemical weapons under international control so that they may ultimately be destroyed,” he said in a statement.
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The Russian proposal emerged only a day earlier after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov seized on a comment made by US Secretary of State John Kerry, who said a US strike against Syrian targets could be averted if Damascus put “every single bit” of its chemical weapons under international control by week’s end.
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http://en.rian.ru/world/20130914/183444186/Obama-Welcomes-US-Russian-Deal-on-Syria.html