Kerry, Hollande Hail Nobel for Chemical Arms Watchdog

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday congratulated the world's chemical arms watchdog for winning the Nobel Peace Prize, praising its bravery and resolve in trying to rid Syria of such weapons.

Since more than 1,000 people were killed in August in a sarin gas attack outside Damascus, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has "taken extraordinary steps and worked with unprecedented speed to address this blatant violation of international norms that shocked the conscience of people around the world," Kerry said.

A team of around 30 OPCW arms experts and U.N. logistics and security personnel are now on the ground in Syria and have started to destroy weapons production facilities, in line with a U.N. Security Council resolution agreed in late September.

"Today, the Nobel Committee has rightly recognized their bravery and resolve to carry out this vital mission amid an ongoing war in Syria," Kerry said in a statement, vowing the world would never forget the victims of the August attack blamed on the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

"I am also particularly mindful of the more than 100,000 Syrians lost in this bloody conflict, and the need for the entire international community to redouble our effort to bring it to an end and give peace-loving Syrians a country to return to, free of carnage," he added.

The top U.S. diplomat arrived earlier Friday in Kabul for a surprise visit to discuss efforts to seal a deal for leaving some U.S. troops in Afghanistan after international forces are withdrawn at the end of 2014.

But he did not address in his statement criticism from the Nobel committee that the United States has failed to destroy all its own chemical weapons stock by April 2012, as required by the international Chemical Weapons Convention.

Meanwhile, French President Francois Hollande said 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.

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.