France said Tuesday that it would initiate a resolution in the United Nations Security Council demanding that Syria reveal the extent of its chemical weapons program and turn its arsenal over to international inspectors to be neutralized, reports the Los Angeles Times.
The announcement by Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius came a day after Russia floated a proposal to put Syrian chemical weapons under international supervision, a new idea that could delay or forestall a U.S.-led military strike.
President Obama is scheduled to deliver a speech to the nation Tuesday evening regarding Syria. "We will pursue this diplomatic track," Obama said in an interview with Fox News on Monday. "I fervently hope that this can be resolved in a nonmilitary way."
Fabius said he greeted the Russian gambit “with interest and caution.”
“With interest, because it’s the first time there’s been this opening. With caution, because Russia has changed its position, and its proposal is difficult to apply,” Fabius told Europe 1 radio Tuesday morning. “We know that Syria has more than a thousand tons of chemical weapons that are difficult to localize and destroy.”
Fabius told reporters later that France would introduce a militarily enforceable resolution at the U.N. calling on Damascus to give up its chemical arms.
Read more of ths report from the Los Angeles Times.