DHAKA: China urged the United States to proceed with extreme caution and return to the United Nations to discuss Syria after Washington said it was not seeking Security Council approval for action in response to a chemical weapons attack last month.

Washington and Paris say forces loyal to president Bashar Assad were behind the attack in which more than 1,400 are estimated to have been killed, and that they are considering air strikes to try to deter him from using such weapons again.

China’s foreign minister Wang Yi said relevant countries should ‘think thrice’ before acting and exercise ‘extreme caution’, and ‘should return to the United Nations Security Council framework to seek consensus and appropriately handle the Syria issue’, Wang told US state secretary John Kerry in a telephone call late on Sunday night, The Jerusalem Post publishes this report on Monday.

BDST: 1428 HRS, SEPT 09, 2013
RoR/BSK