Assad says he will respect chemical weapons convention

Damascus Syria is committed to the convention against chemical weapons it signed under a US-Russian deal and sees “no obstacles” to its implementation, President Bashar al-Assad said in an interview broadcast Thursday.

Speaking to Venezuela’s Telesur, the Syrian leader insisted that his regime was complying with a deal under which Damascus will turn over its chemical weapons for destruction.

“Syria is generally committed to all the agreements that it signs,” he said in an interview on Thursday.

He said Damascus had begun to send the required details of its chemical arsenal to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons which is overseeing the deal, and that OPCW inspectors were expected to visit Syria.

“Experts (from the OPCW) will come to Syria in the coming period to look into the status of these weapons,” he said.

“As the Syrian government, there are no serious obstacles.

“But there is always the possibility that the terrorists will obstruct the work of the experts by preventing them from accessing certain places,” Assad added.

The Syrian regime calls all those fighting against it “terrorists”.