OPCW warns of delay in moving Syria chemical weapons

http://zeenews.india.com/news/world/opcw-warns-of-delay-in-moving-syria-chemical-weapons_895353.html

This article is more or less a notification from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) that there may be a delay in moving Syria’s chemical weapons. The OPCW developed a roadmap with a deadline of December 31^st as the date in which all “priority” weapons will be removed from Syria, but OPCW director Ahmet Uzumcu says this might not happen due to “technical issues”. Although there may be a delay, he says that he is confident that the OPCW will meet the June 2014 deadline, which is the time when all chemical weapons in Syria will be destroyed. The article highlights that 1,290 tons of chemical weapons material are to be destroyed by the latter deadline.

I think that this article is important, especially in the light of the article posted to this blog a few days ago (Syria Chemical Weapons Facilities “Destroyed”) which stressed that we do not know what “destroyed” actually means. This lack of clarification, coupled with this new article saying that the OPCW is having technical difficulties seems to be pointing to the fact that things are not going as smoothly as originally hoped. It also seems as though the OPCW is quick to update the public when things are going right, like the facilities being destroyed, yet brush off delays by reassuring that they will still meet the final deadline. This article also mentions that the Norwegian Nobel committee honored the OPCW as the 2013 peace laureate for their “role in dismantling chemical weapons”, so it does make sense for them to want to keep their public image as high as possible.