DHAKA: Russia has handed the United States a plan for the Syrian regime to hand over its chemical weapons in four stages, starting with Damascus becoming a member of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

The plan, first announced by Moscow this week, aims to avert threatened US military action in retribution for a chemical weapons attack outside Damascus that the West says was perpetrated by the Syrian regime.

Revealing the details of the plan for the first time, Russia’s Kommersant daily on Thursday said it had been given to the American side on Tuesday, although Russia only announced on Wednesday evening that the plan had been passed on, reports The Straits Times.

Speaking in the Kazakh capital Astana, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov did not give details of the plan but said it would work ‘on the understanding that’ it would allow force not to be used.

As a first step, Damascus would join the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Kommersant said, quoting a Russian diplomatic source.

BDST: 2021 HRS, SEPT 12, 2013
RoR/BSK