WASHINGTON, Dec 8, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – The United States and Britain accused
Russia on Friday of fabricating a story about chemical weapons use by Syrian
rebels and warned Moscow against undermining a shaky truce.
Russia’s defense ministry said rebels fired weapons containing chlorine on
November 24 on the regime-held city of Aleppo, with Syrian state media
reporting that around 100 Syrians were hospitalized for breathing
difficulties.
Russia responded to the purported attack with air raids on Idlib, the
latest major stronghold of rebels and jihadists battling President Bashar al-
Assad, throwing into question a truce reached in mid-September.
The United States said it had “credible information” that the chlorine
account was false and that Russian and Syrian forces instead had fired tear
gas.
“The United States is deeply concerned that pro-regime officials have
maintained control of the attack site in its immediate aftermath, allowing
them to potentially fabricate samples and contaminate the site before a
proper investigation of it by the Organization for the Prohibition of
Chemical Weapons,” State Department spokesman Robert Palladino said in a
statement.
“We caution Russia and the regime against tampering with the suspected
attack site and urge them to secure the safety of impartial, independent
inspectors so that those responsible can be held accountable,” he said.
He said that Russia and Syria were “using it as an opportunity to
undermine confidence in the ceasefire in Idlib.”
In a similar statement, Britain said it was “highly unlikely” that
chlorine or the opposition were involved in the incident.
“It is likely that this was either a staged incident intended to frame the
opposition, or an operation which went wrong and from which Russia and the
regime sought to take advantage,” a Foreign Office spokesperson said, also
backing an investigation by the OPCW, the international chemical weapons
watchdog.
– History of chemical attacks –
Russia’s embassy in Washington hit back on Facebook.
“The Russian Defense Ministry does not rule out that the US Department of
State’s allegations about the recent toxic chemicals attack in Syria’s Aleppo
are aimed at distracting the public attention from the crimes of the US
aviation in the east of the Middle Eastern country,” the post said.
Western powers, the United Nations and human rights groups have repeatedly
pointed to chemical attacks by Assad’s forces.
A Syrian gas attack in April 2017 in the town of Khan Sheikhun killed 83
people, according to the United Nations. US President Donald Trump replied by
ordering 59 cruise missiles to strike a Syrian air base, a reversal from his
predecessor Barack Obama’s controversial reluctance to respond militarily.
Russia, the top international backer of Assad, and the Syrian government
both denied the incident, saying footage of suffering victims including
children was staged.
In the latest incident, a US official said that suspicions were raised as
Russia and Syria immediately put out similar official media accounts and
quickly carried out strikes.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that witnesses did
not report the odor of chlorine that is characteristic of such attacks.
“Technical analysis of videos and images of munition remnants indicate the
mortars portrayed in Russian media are not suitable for delivering chlorine,”
the official said.
Russia’s allegations over the latest incident come amid elusive efforts to
find a political solution to Syria’s civil war, which has killed more than
360,000 people and displaced millions.
Negotiators from Russia and fellow Assad ally Iran met last week with
opposition supporter Turkey in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana, making no
apparent headway in a UN-backed goal of setting up a constitutional committee
by the end of the year.
But Russia and Turkey agreed to keep working to preserve the U-shaped
buffer zone around Idlib, which is keeping pro-government forces out of the
region.
Jan Egeland, in a press conference last week before he stepped down as the
head of the UN Humanitarian Task Force for Syria, warned that the flare-up
amounted to “a gigantic powder keg in the middle of three million civilians.”