With President Obama scheduled to address a
deeply skeptical nation on Tuesday night to make the case for military strikes on Syria for
its use of chemical weapons, the diplomatic solution that has been
floated in recent days may be
at hand:
The Syrian government has accepted a Russian proposal to put its chemical weapons under international control to avoid a possible U.S. military strike, Interfax news agency quoted Syria's foreign minister as saying on Tuesday.
"We held a very fruitful round of talks with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov yesterday, and he proposed an initiative relating to chemical weapons. And in the evening we agreed to the Russian initiative," Interfax quoted the minister, Walid al-Moualem, as telling the speaker of Russia's lower house parliament house in Moscow.
On Monday night, President Obama
said that "he's open to though skeptical of" this plan, but did say he would put military strikes on hold if such an agreement were reached:
The president said his team will engage in talks with Russia and Syria. “We’re going to run this to ground,” he told CNN. “And John Kerry and the rest of my national security team will engage with the Russians and the international community to see can we arrive at something that is enforceable and serious.”
... but that:
“We don’t want just a a stalling or delaying tactic to put off the pressure that we have on their right now,” he told NBC.
What this means for tonight's speech or possible votes in Congress remains to be seen.