UN report confirms use of sarin gas in Syria’s chemical weapons attacks

This photo released by the United Nations shows professor Ake Sellstrom, head of the chemical weapons team working in Syria, handing over the report on the Al-Ghouta massacre to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Sunday Sept. 15, 2013. (Photo: AP/United Nations, Paulo Filgueiras)

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Sunday received the report from the UN fact-finding group on the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria. He will brief the UN Security Council on the findings Monday morning, UN spokesman Martin Nesirky told reporters here Sunday.

“The report by the United Nations Mission to Investigate Allegations of the Use of Chemical Weapons in the Syrian Arab Republic has been turned over to the secretary-general,” Nesirky said in a note emailed to reporters.

“It was transmitted today, 15 September, to the secretary-general by Professor Ake Sellstrom, the head of the Mission, and the secretary-general will provide it to the Member States tomorrow morning,” the spokesman added.
“On Monday morning, the secretary-general will brief the Security Council on the report during its closed consultations,” he said.

Following his briefing at the 15-nation Security Council, Ban will speak to reporters at around 12:50 p.m. EDT (1650 GMT) Monday. The text of the report will be made available on Monday morning on the website of the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs, which is http://www.un.org/disarmament/, the spokesman added.

On Sept. 2, samples collected by the UN team in Syria were transferred from The Hague to laboratories for analysis. They were from the site of the alleged use of chemical weapons in the Ghouta area of Damascus, the Syrian capital, on Aug. 21, where over 1,000 people were alleged to have been killed.

The UN has said the analyses would be conducted in laboratories in Europe “strictly adhering to the highest established standards of verification recognized by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.” The fact-finding group was created by the UN chief in March at the request of the Syrian government. The investigators were ordered out of the war-torn country on Aug. 31 to return to The Hague.

The team, which was initially set to investigate the alleged March 19 chemical attacks on Khan al-Asal in the northern province of Aleppo and two other undisclosed sites, arrived in Syria on Aug. 18, and later was told to travel to the Ghouta area.

The UN probe team is mandated to find out whether chemical weapons were used in the Middle East country, but not who used them. On Saturday, the United States and Russia reached an agreement in Geneva on a framework to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons, asking Syria to submit its chemical weapons stockpiles within one week.

The deal also asked Syria to allow international inspectors on the ground by November, and demanded that all its chemical weapons be destroyed or removed by mid-2014. The Syrian government considered the move “a victory for Syria,” saying it will commit itself to the agreement and has started preparing the weapons’ count list.

However, the Syrian opposition on Saturday rejected the deal, vowing to continue to fight on the ground against government forces. Since fighting began in March 2011 between the Syrian government and opposition groups, around 100,000 people have been killed, and millions have fled to neighboring countries or become internally displaced.  (Xinhua)