US: Assad Regime “Systematically” Using Chemical Weapons

At the Hague Wednesday, the U.S. accused the Syrian regime of continuing to use chemical weapons on civilians as recently as September, despite claims that it has fully destroyed its stockpile as required under a 2013 U.N. treaty. The Obama administration frequently cites that U.S.-Russia brokered deal as a major foreign policy success, in part because the diplomatic agreement helped avert U.S. military strikes triggered by a sarin gas attack that killed hundreds of civilians outside Damascus. Yet the Syrian regime has not been completely disarmed of that lethal cache, Undersecretary of State Rose Gottemoeller told members of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW.) “Now there is compelling evidence that Syria continues to use chemical weapons systematically and repeatedly,” Gottemoeller said. In her prepared remarks, Gottemoeller laid out “key findings” from OPCW investigators which indicate that the regime used chemical weapons in attacks against opposition-controlled towns in northern Syria during April and May of this year and again in August and September. Eyewitness reports of regime helicopters indicate that the Syrian government carried these attacks out. The Syrian Coalition calls on the UN Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) “to refer Assad’s chemical weapons file to the International Criminal Court (ICC), along with the files we submitted in this regard which providers compelling evidence on the responsibility of the Assad regime for the use of chemical weapons in many locations across Syria. We also demand the inclusion of the chlorine gas in the list of chemical weapons that the Assad regime has to abandon. Assad has exploited the exclusion of the chlorine gas from the list and used it in many attacks on particularly civilian targets across Syria.” The Syrian Coalition welcomes statements made by officials of the Organization of Prohibition of Chemical Weapons during a meeting that began on Monday in The Hague. Angela Kane, the United Nations’ disarmament chief, said that “Syria must disclose documents about its chemical weapons program and grant full access to inspectors if it wants to convince world powers it has destroyed its entire toxic stockpile. It is up to Syria to be transparent and to come forward, either with documentation, or access to people (involved in the program), or sites.” The Syrian Coalition stresses that the Assad regime has been deliberately hindering the work of the UN commissions of inquiry into Syria’s CWs program and has not fully disclosed its stockpile of chemicals weapons. Despite its announcement that it handed over all of its chemical weapons cache, the Assad regime’s warplanes attacked more than 30 locations in northern Syria using the toxic chlorine gas in blatant defiance of international law and the international community.” (Source: Syrian Coalition + CBS News)