Medical sources have claimed dozens of people were killed in a Douma, Syria chemical attack on Saturday, but those numbers are impossible to verify, prompting Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to say there’s been no evidence found of a chemical weapons attack in Syria’s formerly rebel-held town.
The alleged attack took place over the weekend, however, Lavrov said Russian specialists and aid workers had visited the area, which rebel fighters have started leaving under a surrender deal. “Our military specialists have visited this place, along with representatives of the Syrian Red Crescent… and they did not find any trace of chlorine or any other chemical substance used against civilians,” he said.
More importantly, the US and France have threatened a “joint, strong response.”President Donald Trump said on Monday that the situation was being assessed and “major decisions” would be made within 48 hours. But Moscow has already declared the chemical attack as “false news” and warned against any intervention in Syria.
The Russian Foreign Ministry denounced the latest reports about the chemical attack that allegedly affected dozens of civilians in the militant-controlled town of Douma. It said the reports were another example of a “continuous series of fake news about the use of chlorine and other chemical agents by the government forces.” Even more telling, as the ministry pointed out, was that the source of the reports was the notorious “civil defense” group, the White Helmets, which has been repeatedly accused of having ties to terrorists, as well as other groups based in the US and UK.
According to RT, Russia has previously warned about a false-flag chemical attack being prepared in the recent months, the ministry said. Those who are not interested in a genuine political settlement of the Syrian crisis are seeking to complicate the situation on the ground, it added.
“The goal of this… baseless speculation is to shield the terrorists and… the radical opposition that refuse to engage in a political settlement [process], as well as to justify potential military strikes from the outside,” the statement said. It then warned that any military interference in Syria conducted under “far-fetched or fabricated pretexts” would be “absolutely unacceptable” and could lead to “dire consequences.”
The White Helmets, which claim to be an impartial NGO, saving civilians in war-torn Syria, have repeatedly been busted using false videos of their daily rescue operations.
The Syrian Civil Defense, also known as the White Helmets, has published several clips and pictures, showing the alleged aftermath of the chemical attack in the city of Douma in Eastern Ghouta. The volunteers have reported a widespread suffocation in the area, which led to 42 deaths; the footage, posted on Twitter, shows the alleged victims, including babies in diapers, breathing through oxygen masks.
However, the rescuers appeared to be so focused on accusing President Bashar al-Assad of dropping a chemical bomb on Douma that they forgot to put on gas masks or protective suits themselves.
Meanwhile, the Russian Reconciliation Center has spoken with doctors in Douma, who reported that they had not received any patients with sign of chemical poisoning. Neither did the Syrian Red Crescent Society. The center also said that no traces of chemical agents were found in the area where the alleged attack had taken place, adding that videos spread by the "White Helmets" were “fake,” aimed at derailing the Syrian ceasefire.
The videos were published after several media outlets reported, citing militant sources, that the Syrian government forces had launched a chemical attack on Douma, while Jaysh al-Islam claimed that the army had dropped a chemical bomb on the city.
Both Syria and Russia have repeatedly warned of the forthcoming fabricated chemical attacks on Douma weeks prior to the alleged incident, saying that such disinformation campaigns are aimed at covering up terrorists and justifying military action. Responding to the claims, the Syrian government argued that such allegations were being made by terrorists to halt Syrian forces’ advances and insisted that Damascus did not need such measures to fight militants.
The Russian Defense Ministry, for its part, has denied the allegations, insisting that several Western states and such NGOs as the infamous White Helmets have been carrying out a disinformation campaign to undermine the withdrawal of Jaysh al-Islam militants from the area.
“We strongly deny these claims and announce our readiness to send Russian experts in radiation, chemical and biological defense to Douma after its liberation from terrorists to gather evidence, which would prove that the allegations of the chemical weapons use were staged,” said Maj. Gen. Yuri Yevtushenko, commander of the reconciliation center.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has stressed that Moscow sought for a just investigation into the incident, and reiterated that Russian military specialists did not find any traces of a chemical attack at site. He has also recalled that last year the White Helmets also worked without any protective clothes at the alleged site of a sarin gas attack.
The UN Security Council held an emergency meeting on security in the Middle East, in the wake of reports of an alleged chemical attack in the Syrian city of Douma.
The UN special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, opened the meeting by describing the reports about the alleged chemical attack in Douma and the subsequent airstrike against the Syrian T-4 air base. He called for an “independent investigation” of the alleged chemical incident and urged restraint for all sides, in view of the airbase attack.
Russia is deeply concerned by the fact that some capitals, Washington as well as London and Paris, which are “blindly following” their US allies, have engaged “in a confrontational policy against Russia and Syria without any justification,”The Russian Ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, said during the meeting. He went on to say that Moscow recently faced “slander, hawkish rhetoric, sanctions, blackmail” and even “threats of force.”
Western states are now threatening and slandering Russia with a ferocity that their governments “did not take the liberty” to unleash during the Cold War, Nebenzia added. “Russia has been inexcusably threatened,” he said.
Nebenzia stressed that every time the Western powers interfere into other states’ affairs, they “leave only chaos behind.” “Do you understand the dangerous threshold to which you are bringing the world?” the Russian envoy asked.
There is “no doubt” that the alleged chemical attack in Syria’s Douma was staged, Nebenzia said, commenting on the developments in Eastern Ghouta. He then called for an impartial probe into the reported incident, which should begin with the presumption of innocence.
The UN chemical watchdog must visit Syria and investigate the allegations, Nebenzia said, calling on the Organization for the Prohibition of the Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to visit Douma as early as Tuesday. Syrian and Russian troops would provide the inspectors with a safe passage to the area of the alleged chemical attack in Douma after they arrive to Damascus, he said.
Nebenzia questioned the 'evidence' provided by the controversial White Helmets group. In particular, he said the scene of an alleged chemical strike was a fake, saying that it seemed “unnatural” that the bomb “struck the roof of a building and then fell on a wooden bed without even damaging it.”
The US will act against the Syrian government with or without a UN blessing, US envoy Nikki Haley told the Security Council, blaming Russian “obstructionism” for allowing the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria and beyond.
“We are beyond showing pictures of dead babies. We are beyond appeals to conscience. We have reached the moment when the world must see justice done,” Haley declared to the Security Council on Monday, accusing Russia of backing the “monster” [Bashar] Assad, who was murdering children with chemical weapons.
“The Russian regime, whose hands are all covered with the blood of Syrian children, cannot be ashamed by pictures of its victims. We’ve tried that before,” Haley said, adding that “no civilized government would have anything to do with Assad’s murderous regime.”
Moscow has challenged claims, made by the Western-backed NGO ‘White Helmets’ and Jaysh al-Islam (Army of Islam) militants, that the Syrian government conducted a chemical attack against civilians in the Damascus suburb of Douma. Russia’s envoy to the UN Vassily Nebenzia called it “fake news,” noting that no traces of the alleged attack were found in the area after Syrian troops liberated it from the militants.
Haley, however, spoke of the attack as if it and the Syrian government’s culpability were proven facts. If the UN refused to follow Washington’s lead and intervene in Syria due to “Russia’s obstructionism,” Haley said, the US will go it alone.
“History will record this as the moment when the Security Council either discharged its duty or demonstrated its utter and complete failure to protect the people of Syria. Either way, the United States will respond,” she said.
Earlier in the meeting, Nebenzia had warned the US and its allies of the possible “grave consequences” of unauthorized military action against Syria, where Russian troops have been legally deployed at the invitation of the country’s internationally recognized government.
“What [the] military misadventures of the West bring about is well known, as shown by the examples of Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya. Nobody has vested you with the power to act like the world’s policeman, or to act like the prosecutor, judge, and executioner either,” he said.
The US cited humanitarian concerns to launch NATO attacks on Yugoslavia in 1999 and in Libya in 2011. The latter began as the UN mandate to establish a no-fly zone and, within days, turned into a “regime change” operation. In 2003, the US invaded Iraq without UN authority, claiming the threat of Iraqi nuclear and chemical weapons of mass destruction (WMD). No such weapons were ever found.
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