France’s deputy U.N. ambassador says an global team is blaming the Syrian government and Islamic State militants for chemical weapons attacks in the conflict-wracked nation during 2014 and 2015.
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The report found that the Syrian regime dropped chemical weapons on two villages in northwestern Idlib province: Talmenes on April 21, 2014 and Sarmin on March 16, 2015.
The United States will seek accountability at the U.N. and the OPCW and has placed “a high priority” on targeting the DAESH’s chemical weapons capabilities, Price said.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon received a report from the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)-UN joint investigation on Wednesday (August 24).
The UN and OPCW have concluded in their year-long investigation, that both the Syrian government and ISIS have used chemical weapons during the crisis in war-torn Syria.
On August 21, 2013, hundreds of people were killed in a Sarin gas attack in Ghouta, a massacre that United Nations inspectors call “the most significant confirmed use of chemical weapons against civilians since Saddam Hussein used them” in Halabja in 1988.
Russia, although it supported the establishment of the JIM, is a close ally of Syria and has previously blocked sanctions and other council action against President Assad’s government.
The Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ed Royce, said in a statement Thursday that Assad’s use of chemical weapons had made “a mockery” of Obama’s red line. The report describes the findings as a “troubling pattern of incomplete and inaccurate Syrian disclosures over the past three years about the scope of the country’s chemical weapons program”.
Previous reports have found indications that people in Syria were exposed to chemical weapons, including deadly sarin gas.
“When it comes to proliferation, the use of chemical weapons, of such weapons of mass destruction, we can not afford to be weak”.
Assad vowed in 2013 to eliminate the country’s chemical weapons program after the US vowed to conduct airstrikes against government targets.
The Security Council is scheduled to discuss the report on August 30.
It examined nine cases in seven towns where chemical weapons were believed to have been used, and identified responsible parties in three cases. At the time, Isis fighters were attacking rebels.
The UK will also work to prevent future use of the weapons, Mr Johnson said.
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The Assad regime has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons in Syria, but the report said that in the three cases, it had “sufficient information to reach a conclusion on the actors involved”.
