Damascus, January 9 (RHC)-- The United Nations has begun moving Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile out of the country as part of the disarmament program agreed to last year.

UN spokesperson Farhan Haq announced the latest step, saying that an initial quantity of "priority chemical materials" was moved from two sites to the port of Lattakia in Syria for verification and was then loaded onto a Danish cargo ship. He said that the vessel was accompanied by naval escorts provided by Denmark and Norway, as well as the Syrian Arab Republic.

The United Nations confirmed that this movement initiates the process of transfer of chemical materials from Syria to locations outside its territory for destruction. The weapons will eventually be transferred to a U.S. ship and destroyed in international waters.