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UN chemical experts leave Syria at end of mission: AFP
by Staff Writers
Beirut (AFP) Sept 30, 2013


France, Britain and China to be in Syria peace talks: Fabius
Paris (AFP) Sept 30, 2013 - Britain, France and China will be involved in a peace conference on Syria due in Geneva in November, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Monday.

The US-Russia peace initiative, dubbed Geneva 2, will involve all five permanent members of the UN Security Council, Fabius told France Inter radio, rebuffing a claim by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that the Europeans had no role to play.

Fabius said Geneva 2 should aim to reach agreement on a "transition government for a united Syria that respects minorities."

"Mr Bashar al-Assad can say what he wants," Fabius said.

"In Geneva 2, we want to find an accord between the representatives of the regime and the moderate opposition, so that it is not the terrorists, the extremists, Al-Qaeda who reap the benefits," he added.

Fabius said extremists only comprised about 20 percent of the opposition fighters.

Assad, who has pledged to comply with a UN resolution and hand over chemical weapons for destruction, said in an interview on Sunday that European countries had no place in the Geneva 2 talks.

"Frankly, most European countries are unable to play a role in Geneva 2, because they do not have all the necessary factors to succeed in such a role," the Syrian President was quoted as saying by Syria's official news agency.

"They have adopted the United States' policy in their relations with the countries (of the Middle East) ever since George Bush was president. How can they play a role if they lack credibility?"

A team of UN experts investigating the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria crossed into Lebanon on Monday at the end of their mission, an AFP correspondent said.

The team, which arrived in Syria last Wednesday, is due to submit a report next month about seven alleged chemical weapons attacks during the conflict in Syria.

A second, separate group of inspectors from the Hague-based Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons is also expected to arrive in Syria on Tuesday.

That team will be inspecting Syria's chemical arsenal, which Damascus has agreed to turn over for destruction under a US-Russia deal now enshrined in a UN Security Council resolution.

The UN experts were on their second mission to Syria, after a first trip in August when they confirmed the use of sarin in the outskirts of Damascus.

The deadly nerve agent was used in an August 21 attack while the experts were in Damascus on a mission originally intended to investigate other alleged chemical weapons attacks.

The Syrian regime and the rebels battling to overthrow it have traded accusations of chemical weapons use during the country's conflict.

Other alleged attacks the UN team probed include a March 19 incident in Khan al-Assal, in Aleppo province of northern Syria, an April attack in the Sheikh Maqsud neighbourhood of Aleppo city, and Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib on the border with Turkey.

In addition to this, the team investigated alleged attacks on August 22 in Bahhariyeh, near Damascus, on August 24 in the Jubar district of the capital, and a seventh incident reported in Ashrafiyeh Sahnaya in Damascus province on August 25.

UN officials had said the team would not visit Khan al-Assal, Saraqeb or Sheikh Maqsud, noting the alleged attacks there took place in March and April and the bio-medical evidence will have mostly degraded.

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