S/PV.8673 Security Council

The Security Council will now begin its consideration of the item on its agenda. The Council has before it the text of a statement by the President on behalf of the Council on the subject of today’s meeting. I thank the Council members for their valuable contributions to the statement. In accordance with the understanding reached among the members of the Council, I shall take it that the members of the Security Council agree to the statement, which will be issued as a document of the Security Council under the symbol S/PRST/2019/14. I shall now give the floor to those members of the Council who wish to make statements.

The Russian Federation joined the consensus on presidential statement S/PRST/2019/14 primarily because of our serious concerns about the numerous incidents involving terrorist and extremist groups’ use of chemical weapons in the Middle East, including for the purposes of provocation. We urge Council members to view this consensus as an invitation to solve problems in a non-confrontational manner and in strict compliance with the international legal provisions of the Chemical Weapons Convention. We would like to believe that in practice all States parties to the Convention, without exception, will be able to confirm their desire to support the integrity of the Convention, improve the overall situation in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and restore its true purpose as a strictly specialized and depoliticized international entity.

I would first like to welcome the efforts of you and your delegation, Madam President, in arriving at the adoption of presidential statement S/PRST/2019/14. France firmly supports the chemical-weapon non-proliferation regime and the work of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in implementing the Chemical Weapons Convention. We commend the work of the United Kingdom and today’s adoption of a presidential statement that reminds us of the major principles on which its intention is based. We trust that the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons will faithfully discharge is functions. We call upon each and every one of us to ensure that all stakeholders and inspectors enjoy unimpeded and unconditional access to the sites concerned, and I call on all stakeholders and all the members of the Security Council to ensure that together we can move along a path towards the complete chemical weapons disarmament in Syria.

As I shall not read out the statement (S/PRST/2019/14) in the interest of time, I will just make it clear, for those watching and listening, that the presidential statement is about the briefing that the Council received from the Director-General of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) on 5 November (see S/PV.8659), under the agenda item “The situation in the Middle East”, and it is also about cooperation between the United Nations and the OPCW and upholding the Chemical Weapons Convention. It does not go into any questions of attribution. I shall now make a statement in my capacity as the representative of the United Kingdom. I would just like to say that I support what the French representative said. There are some differences among Council members on attribution, but it is very important that all Member States, including the Syrian Arab Republic, abide by their commitments under the Chemical Weapons Convention. I now resume my functions as President of the Security Council.