Kazakhstan hopes for Syrian war end after transfer of chemical weapons

Kazakhstan hopes that the war in Syria will end after the country transfers the chemical weapons under international control, Kazakhstan Prime-Minister’s official website writes citing Prime-Minister Serik Akhmetov as saying at the summit of the Collective Security Treaty organization (CSTO) in Sochi. CSTO members-countries have signed a joint statement calling to establish a political dialog between the opposing parties in Syria without any setting any prior conditions. CSTO countries support Russia’s efforts to settle the Syrian crisis solely through a political-diplomatic way and support the agreements between Russia and the United States on the transfer of the Syrian chemical weapons under the international control, RIA Novosti writes. The joint statement spells out the CSTO member-countries' position that Syrians should be the ones who end the war in Syria. The country’s sovereignty should be maintained, violence should stop and the political dialog between the government forces and the opposition should be established “without any pre-conditions based on the Geneva communique dated July 30, 2012”. “We believe that the decision of the Syrian authorities to transfer the chemical weapons under the international control will become a real prerequisite for settlement of the conflict in Syria. In this context, Geneva-2 Conference gives a good opportunity for stopping the violence and defining the political future of Syria through a dialog and peace-making,” Akhmetov stressed. Syrian authorities have started sharing the information about the available chemical weapons as part of the actions required for the transfer of the country’s weapons under the international control and stopping the war. Russian and U.S. Foreign Ministers agreed to remove or destroy the weapons by the middle of 2014.