Syria’s president, Bashar Assad, said his country is committed to its agreements on getting rid of chemical weapons, adding that they are something of a burden, as their destruction is costly and he has no use for them.
“Syria is generally committed to all the agreements that it
signs,” Assad said in an interview with TeleSUR TV, adding
that his government is complying with the demand that chemical
weapons be submitted for destruction.
In another interview, with Arabic daily Al-Akhbar, Assad stated
that “in Syria there are thousands of tons of chemical weapons
that have become a burden to us, since their destruction costs a
great deal of money and could take years to destroy.”
Damascus has started sending details of its arsenal to the
Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which is
supervising the deal. Inspectors from the organization are
expected to visit Syria “in the coming period” to examine
the status of the weapons.
However, Assad also said there was “always the possibility
that the terrorists will obstruct the work of the experts by
preventing them from accessing certain places.” Assad’s
government refers to the rebels as “terrorists.”
Syria will suffer no great loss should the weaponry be removed
from the country, Assad said. He pointed out that Syria has
considerably more sophisticated weapons in his arsenal. “We
now possess deterrent weapons that are more important and more
sophisticated than chemical weapons,” he said.
“We created chemical weapons in the 80s as a deterrent against
Israel's nuclear arsenal. Today, it is no longer a weapon of
deterrence,” Assad said.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Thursday
that Moscow was prepared to help guard Syria’s chemical weapons
before they get destroyed. “We will be ready to help in
guarding those facilities where work is being carried out,”
Interfax news agency reported Ryabkov as saying during a visit to
an arms fair.
Assad praised a “collaboration with Russia,” adding that
the country would intervene if Syria is attacked. Assad has not
yet eliminated the idea that the US could still strike, despite
his full commitment to any agreement.
“The chemical weapons are not the goal of the United States
and their allies, and they never have been…they wanted to change
the balance of power and to protect Israel,” he commented.
The UN Security Council is currently working on agreeing to a
resolution on Syria’s chemical weapons that is acceptable in the
eyes of both Russia and Western countries.
The chemical weapons deal was agreed to following an attack which
took place in an eastern suburb of Damascus on August 21, which
killed hundreds of people. UN experts established that sarin gas
had been used, and returned to Damascus on Wednesday to conduct
investigations into other alleged attacks.
“We are the ones who invited them to come to Syria in March
when the terrorists used poison gas in a suburb of the city of
Aleppo,” he said.
Assad’s government was accused of carrying out the August assault
by Washington and its western allies, while Syria’s leader denies
involvement.
While remaining aware of the possibility of a US strike, Assad
stated that he is not overly-concerned about the possibility that
the UN may pass a resolution allowing the use of force against
his government.
“Today there is balance in the Security Council,” he said,
referring to Russia.