Last Update: January 28, 2023, 23:56 IST
US soldiers inspect the area during an ongoing joint patrol in Manbij, Syria (Image: Reuters)
Syria rejected the report published on Friday by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)
Syria on Saturday rejected a report by the global chemical weapons watchdog that blamed Damascus for a 2018 chlorine attack that killed 43 people, calling it “false”.
“Syria completely rejects the report published on Friday by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW),” the foreign ministry said in a statement carried by state news agency SANA.
“The report lacks scientific evidence,” it said, rejecting “false conclusions”.
In the OPCW report, investigators said there were “reasonable grounds to believe” that at least one Syrian Air Force helicopter had dropped two cylinders of poison gas on the rebel-held town of Douma.
Damascus and its ally Moscow say the April 7, 2018 attack was carried out by defectors at the behest of the United States, which later launched airstrikes on Syria along with Britain and France.
The OPCW rejected claims that insurgents and emergency workers had staged the attack.
Its team “thoroughly pursued inquiries and scenarios suggested by Syrian officials and other state parties, but was unable to obtain any concrete information to support them.”
Emergency workers said at the time that they had treated people suffering from shortness of breath, foaming at the mouth and other symptoms.
The Douma case sparked controversy after two former staffers leaked it, accusing the Hague-based watchdog of changing its original findings to make them more credible.
But the OPCW said its investigators “considered a range of possible scenarios” and concluded that “the Syrian Arab Air Force is the perpetrator of this attack”.
Damascus denies using chemical weapons and insists it handed over its stockpiles under a 2013 accord that was prompted by a suspected sarin gas attack that killed 1,400 people in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta.
Syria’s voting rights in the OPCW were suspended in 2021 for refusing to cooperate following allegations of more chemical attacks.
Nearly half a million people have been killed in Syria’s conflict, which began in 2011 and has displaced nearly half of the country’s pre-war population.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)