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Security Council officials evaluated the Syrian regime’s announcement of getting rid of its chemical store and its increasing chemical weapons activities, coinciding with the 11th anniversary of the Resolution’s adoption 2118 in 2013.
Throughout the discussion that followed the meeting, on September 5, 2024, several speakers recalled the Council’s agreed adoption of resolution 2118 (2013), which came after the use of chemical weapons in the Damascus countryside on 21 August 2013. Many expressed their worries regarding the emergence of the pending new issues along with Syria’s declaration under the Chemical Weapons Convention.
The Representatives of the Countries participating in the meeting advised the Syrian regime to continue cooperating with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to seriously find a solution for these pending issues, while some other issues rose, about the regularity of Council meetings on the Syrian regime’s declarations on chemical weapons.
After targeting the Damascus countryside with chemical weapons in 2013, and proving the use of sarin gas as a fatal weapon, countries called for a request to verify the Syrian regime’s use of these chemical weapons, which prompted the United Nations to threaten the regime, putting its chemical arsenal at the disposal of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) under Resolution 2118, and destroying the arsenal in October 2013, after Syria’s accession to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use of Chemical Weapons on September 13.
On September 28, 2013, the Security Council adopted unanimously its first resolution dismantling Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal, which committed the Syrian regime to the timetable set out in the (OPCW) implementation plan, and afterward established the joint OPCW-UN mission to supervise the implementation of the destruction program.
The (OPCW) started initial inspections of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal on October 1, 2013, as the actual destruction began on October 6, and the destruction of the arsenal was completed on January 4, 2016, according to the (OPCW).
chemical_attack chemical_weapons opcw SecurityCouncil syria
