PARIS: French President Francois Hollande said on Friday that the OPCW's winning of the Nobel Peace Prize was a "vindication" of international efforts to destroy Syria's chemical weapons arsenal.
"The Nobel prize is a vindication of all that France, and not just France, committed in the last few weeks to denouncing the use of chemical weapons and to eliminating them in the near future," Hollande told journalists during a visit to the Paris suburbs.
The Hague-based Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an obscure body recently thrust into the spotlight by the Syria crisis, won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for its work to rid the world of chemical arms.
In a separate statement, Hollande promised France's full support for the OPCW's operations in Syria.
"France fully supports the OPCW in its essential mission to destroy Syria's (chemical) arsenal," Hollande said.
"I hope that this award strengthens its mission for the complete and definitive elimination of chemical weapons throughout the world," Hollande said.
"These weapons of terror were used once again on August 21, 2013 by the Syrian regime against civilians: such acts of barbarism must never be able to be repeated," he said.
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