UN watchdog examines eight alleged gas attacks in Syria this year

A UN chemical weapons watchdog is examining allegations of eight toxic gas attacks in Syria since the beginning of this year, according to a report released Friday.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons is tasked with investigating allegations of such attacks in Syria after the government joined the Chemical Weapons Convention in 2013.  

In a report to the Security Council, OPCW Director-General Ahmet Uzumcu said "eight incidents of alleged use of chemical weapons have been recorded since the beginning of 2017 and are currently being analyzed."

He did not specify where the latest attacks allegedly occurred.

Fact-finding missions are already investigating incidents in eastern Aleppo city, western Rif Aleppo, South Homs and North Hama, Rif Damashq and Idlib, said the report sent to the council on Monday.

Witnesses have been interviewed and the OPCW teams continue to gather evidence in those cases.

The Syrian government has asked the OPCW to investigate four alleged chemical attacks in the area of Aleppo from September to November last year, the report added. 

In those cases, Russia has provided samples that have been sent to OPCW laboratories for analysis.  

After the OPCW said chlorine bombs had been dropped on at least three villages in Syria in 2014 and 2015, a UN-led investigation concluded that the Syrian air force was responsible for those attacks.

Britain, France and the United States presented a draft Security Council resolution last week that would have imposed sanctions on those responsible for the chlorine attacks, but the measure was vetoed by Russia and China.

The investigative panel also found that the Islamic State group was behind the use of mustard gas in an attack in 2015.

Human Rights Watch has accused Syrian government forces of carrying out at least eight chemical attacks during the final weeks of the battle for Aleppo late last year, killing nine people and injuring hundreds more.

OPCW experts are still waiting to inspect the Scientific Studies and Research Center, which oversees Syria's chemical weapons program, after several scheduled inspections were delayed, the report said.

The center, known by its acronym CERS, was on a proposed blacklist for UN sanctions that was scrapped by the Russian and Chinese double veto.

The Syrian government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons in the war that has killed 310,000 people since March 2011. 

source: AFP