Tag Archives: Chemical Weapons

Red Cross says seven treated for exposure to toxic agents near Mosul

Khatla Ali Abdullah, 90, is embraced as she flees her home as Iraqi forces battle with Islamic State militants in western Mosul. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Five children and two women are receiving treatment for exposure to chemical agents near the Iraqi city of Mosul, where Islamic State is fighting U.S.-backed Iraqi forces, the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday.

The ICRC “condemns in the strongest possible terms the use of chemical weapons during fighting around the Iraqi city of Mosul”, it said in a statement.

The organization said it did not know which side used the chemical agents that caused blisters, redness in the eyes, irritation, vomiting, and coughing.

The United States has warned that Islamic State could use weapons containing sulfur mustard agents to repel the offensive on the northern Iraqi city.

ICRC medical teams were supporting local medical teams treating the seven patients, who were admitted over the past two days to Rozhawa hospital in Erbil, east of Mosul, the organization said.

The ICRC had reinforced 13 medical centers in areas surrounding Mosul with capacity to treat gas attacks victims, ahead of the offensive that started in October.

Iraqi forces captured the eastern side of Mosul in January after 100 days of fighting and launched their attack on the districts that lie west of the Tigris river on Feb. 19.

Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the caliphate declared by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in 2014, over parts of Iraq and Syria.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli in Baghdad and Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by Dominic Evans)

South Korea suggests North’s suspension from U.N. over airport killing

Yun Byung-se, Minister of Foreign Affairs of South Korea, addresses the Conference on Disarmament at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland February 28, 2017. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

By Stephanie Nebehay and Joseph Sipalan

GENEVA/KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – South Korea called for “collective measures” to punish North Korea for using chemical weapons to kill the estranged half-brother of its leader Kim Jong Un, as Malaysia said on Tuesday it would charge two women with murder over the airport attack.

Police have said the women smeared VX nerve agent, a chemical on a United Nations list of banned weapons of mass destruction, on Kim Jong Nam’s face in an assault captured on security cameras in the Malaysian capital’s airport on Feb. 13.

Speaking at the U.N.-backed Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva on Tuesday, South Korea’s Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se said the use of chemical weapons was a “wake-up call” and the international community should act – including possibly suspending the isolated North’s seat at the United Nations.

North Korea has rejected allegations of its involvement in the killing of Kim Jong Nam, but U.S. and South Korean officials believe he was the victim of an assassination orchestrated by Pyongyang.

“Many international media pointed out that North Korea’s use of chemical weapons for the targeted killing in a third country sent a very clear message to the world,” South Korea’s Yun told the Geneva forum.

“Namely this impulsive, unpredictable, trigger-happy and brutal regime is ready and willing to strike anyone, anytime, anywhere.”

North Korea’s delegation at the conference told Reuters it would respond to Yun’s speech later on Tuesday.

Malaysian police arrested a Vietnamese woman, Doan Thi Huong, and an Indonesian, Siti Aishah, in the days after the attack.

Police are also holding one North Korean man and have identified seven other North Koreans wanted in connection with a case that reads like the plot to a spy movie.

Both women will be formally charged on Wednesday under section 302 of the penal code, which carries the death penalty, Malaysia’s attorney general, Mohamed Apandi Ali, confirmed to Reuters in a text message.

DEADLY NERVE AGENT

VX is one of the deadliest chemical weapons ever created, far more potent than Sarin, the gas used in deadly chemical attacks in Syria in 2013 and in an attack on the Tokyo subway by a Japanese doomsday cult in 1995.

“Just a few grams of VX is sufficient for mass killing,” Yun said.

“North Korea is reported to have not just grams but thousands of tonnes of chemical weapons, including VX, all over the country … The recent assassination is a wake-up call to all of us to North Korea’s chemical weapons capability and its intent to actually use them.”

North Korea has previously denied possessing chemical weapons.

States could invoke the Chemical Weapons Convention as the use of such agents was in “flagrant violation of international law”, Yun said. Malaysia is part of the 1993 pact prohibiting their production, transfer and use, but North Korea is not.

Once the Malaysian government releases the results of its investigation, the U.N. Security Council and state parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention should take up the case as a “high priority agenda”, Yun said.

States that have ratified the chemical weapons ban could invoke the treaty and “take collective measures”, he added.

“It could take the form of suspension of North Korea’s rights and privileges as a U.N. member,” he said.

‘REALITY TV PRANK’

Malaysia’s investigation into the killing has sparked diplomatic tension with North Korea, and on Tuesday a high- ranking delegation arrived in Kuala Lumpur from Pyongyang in a bid to smooth ties.

North Korea’s official media has made no mention of Kim Jong Nam, who had been living in exile, under Beijing’s protection, in the Chinese territory of Macau, and had criticised the regime of his family and his half-brother, Kim Jong Un.

But a report last week from the North’s KCNA state news agency blamed Malaysia for the death of one of its citizens there.

Security camera footage, which has been broadcast in the media, showed two women assaulting Kim Jong Nam in the departure hall of Kuala Lumpur International Airport. He died within 20 minutes.

Both of the women arrested have told diplomats from their countries that they had been paid to take part in what they believed was a prank for a reality television show.

Huong, the Vietnamese woman, was detained 48 hours after the murder in the same airport terminal where Kim Jong Nam was killed.

She is believed to be the woman wearing a white shirt emblazoned with the acronym “LOL”, whose image was caught on security cameras while waiting for a taxi after the attack.

The Indonesian woman, Siti Aishah, was detained a day later.

Police have said the women knew what they were doing when they attacked Kim Jong Nam and were instructed to wash their hands afterwards.

Police said Aishah fell sick, vomiting repeatedly while in custody possibly as a side-effect of VX, though Indonesian embassy officials have subsequently said she was in good health.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in GENEVA, Joseph Sipalan and Angie Teo in KUALA LUMPUR and Zahra Matarani in JAKARTA; Writing by Alex Richardson; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Exclusive: Assad linked to Syrian chemical attacks for first time

women affected by chemical weapon attack in Syria

By Anthony Deutsch

(Reuters) – International investigators have said for the first time that they suspect President Bashar al-Assad and his brother are responsible for the use of chemical weapons in the Syrian conflict, according to a document seen by Reuters.

A joint inquiry for the United Nations and global watchdog the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) had previously identified only military units and did not name any commanders or officials.

Now a list has been produced of individuals whom the investigators have linked to a series of chlorine bomb attacks in 2014-15 – including Assad, his younger brother Maher and other high-ranking figures – indicating the decision to use toxic weapons came from the very top, according to a source familiar with the inquiry.

The Assads could not be reached for comment but a Syrian government official said accusations that government forces had used chemical weapons had “no basis in truth”. The government has repeatedly denied using such weapons during the civil war, which is almost six years old, saying all the attacks highlighted by the inquiry were the work of rebels or the Islamic State militant group.

The list, which has been seen by Reuters but has not been made public, was based on a combination of evidence compiled by the U.N.-OPCW team in Syria and information from Western and regional intelligence agencies, according to the source, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue.

Reuters was unable to independently review the evidence or to verify it.

The U.N.-OPCW inquiry – known as the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) – is led by a panel of three independent experts, supported by a team of technical and administrative staff. It is mandated by the U.N. Security Council to identify individuals and organizations responsible for chemical attacks in Syria.

Virginia Gamba, the head of the Joint Investigative Mechanism, denied any list of individual suspects had yet been compiled by the inquiry.

“There are no … identification of individuals being considered at this time,” she told Reuters by email.

The use of chemical weapons is banned under international law and could constitute a war crime. (For graphic on chemical attacks in Syria, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2cukvFr)

While the inquiry has no judicial powers, any naming of suspects could lead to their prosecution. Syria is not a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC), but alleged war crimes could be referred to the court by the Security Council – although splits among global powers over the war make this a distant prospect at present.

“The ICC is concerned about any country where crimes are reported to be committed,” a spokesman for the court said when asked for comment. “Unless Syria accepts the ICC jurisdiction, the only way that (the) ICC would have jurisdiction over the situation would be through a referral by the Security Council.”

The list seen by Reuters could form the basis for the inquiry team’s investigations this year, according to the source. It is unclear whether the United Nations or OPCW will publish the list separately.

‘HIGHEST LEVELS’

The list identifies 15 people “to be scrutinized in relation to use of CW (chemical weapons) by Syrian Arab Republic Armed Forces in 2014 and 2015”. It does not specify what role they are suspected of playing, but lists their titles.

It is split into three sections. The first, titled “Inner Circle President” lists six people including Assad, his brother who commands the elite 4th Armoured Division, the defense minister and the head of military intelligence.

The second section names the air force chief as well as four commanders of air force divisions. They include the heads of the 22nd Air Force Division and the 63rd Helicopter Brigade, units that the inquiry has previously said dropped chlorine bombs.

The third part of the list – “Other relevant Senior Mil Personnel” – names two colonels and two major-generals.

Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, an independent specialist in biological and chemical weapons who monitors Syria, told Reuters the list reflected the military chain of command.

“The decisions would be made at the highest levels initially and then delegated down. Hence the first use would need to be authorized by Assad,” said de Bretton-Gordon, a former commander of British and NATO chemical and biological defense divisions who frequently visits Syria for professional consultancy work.

The Syrian defense ministry and air force could not be reached for comment.

CHLORINE BARREL BOMBS

Syria joined the international Chemical Weapons Convention under a U.S.-Russian deal that followed the deaths of hundreds of civilians in a sarin gas attack in Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus in August 2013.

It was the deadliest use of chemicals in global warfare since the 1988 Halabja massacre at the end of the Iran-Iraq war, which killed at least 5,000 people in Iraqi Kurdistan.

The Syrian government, which denied its forces were behind the Ghouta attack, also agreed to hand over its declared stockpile of 1,300 tonnes of toxic weaponry and dismantle its chemical weapons program under international supervision.

The United Nations and OPCW have been investigating whether Damascus is adhering to its commitments under the agreement, which averted the threat of U.S.-led military intervention.

The bodies appointed the panel of experts to conduct the inquiry, and its mandate runs until November. The panel published a report in October last year which said Syrian government forces used chemical weapons at least three times in 2014-2015 and that Islamic State used mustard gas in 2015.

The October report identified Syria’s 22nd Air Force Division and 63rd Helicopter Brigade as having dropped chlorine bombs and said people “with effective control in the military units … must be held accountable”.

The source familiar with the inquiry said the October report had clearly established the institutions responsible and that the next step was to go after the individuals.

Washington on Thursday blacklisted 18 senior Syrian officials based on the U.N.-OPCW inquiry’s October report – some of whom also appear on the list seen by Reuters – but not Assad or his brother.

The issue of chemical weapons use in Syria has become a deeply political one, and the U.N.-OPCW inquiry’s allegations of chlorine bomb attacks by government forces have split the U.N. Security Council’s veto-wielding members.

The United States, Britain and France have called for sanctions against Syria, while Assad’s ally Russia has said the evidence presented is insufficient to justify such measures.

A Security Council resolution would be required to bring Assad and other senior Syrian officials before the International Criminal Court for any possible war crimes prosecution – something Russia would likely block.

(Additional reporting by Ellen Francis in Beirut; Editing by Pravin Char)

U.S. sanctions Syrian officials for chemical weapons attacks

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States on Thursday blacklisted 18 senior Syrian officials it said were connected to the country’s weapons of mass destruction program, after an international investigation found Syrian government forces were responsible for chlorine gas attacks against civilians.

The action marked the first time the United States has sanctioned Syrian military officials for the government’s use of chemical weapons, according to a Treasury Department statement.

A joint inquiry by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) found that Syrian government forces were responsible for three chlorine gas attacks and that Islamic State militants had used mustard gas, according to reports seen by Reuters in August and October.

Chlorine’s use as a weapon is banned under the Chemical Weapons Convention, which Syria joined in 2013. If inhaled, chlorine gas turns into hydrochloric acid in the lungs and can kill by burning lungs and drowning victims in the resulting body fluids.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government has denied its forces have used chemical weapons.

“We condemn in the strongest possible terms the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons,” Ned Price, a White House National Security Council spokesman, said in a statement. “The Assad regime’s barbaric continued attacks demonstrate its willingness to defy basic standards of human decency, its international obligations, and longstanding global norms.”

Following the reports of the international inquiry, Britain and France circulated a draft resolution to the U.N. Security Council in December that would ban the sale or supply of helicopters to the Syrian government and blacklist 11 Syrian military commanders and officials over chemical weapons attacks during the nearly six-year war.

A vote on the draft resolution has not yet been set, but diplomats said Syrian ally Russia, one of five council veto powers, has made clear it opposed the measures.

Ten of the individuals sanctioned by the United States on Thursday are listed for designation in the draft resolution, which – if adopted – would subject them to a global travel ban and asset freeze.

Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said in November that there was “just not enough material proof to do anything” and described the French and British bid to impose U.N. sanctions as a “misplaced effort.”

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Moscow and Washington. The Security Council backed that deal with a resolution that said in the event of non-compliance, “including unauthorized transfer of chemical weapons, or any use of chemical weapons by anyone” in Syria, it would impose measures that could include sanctions.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols and Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Jonathan Oatis)

Islamic State executes scores, stockpiles chemicals in Mosul

Recently displaced people rush a food distribution point in Khazer refugee camp,

GENEVA, Nov 11 (Reuters) – Islamic State fighters have executed scores more people around Mosul this week and are reportedly stockpiling ammonia and sulphur in civilian areas, possibly for use as chemical weapons, U.N. human rights spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said on Friday.

A mass grave with over 100 bodies found in the town of Hammam al-Alil was one of several Islamic State killing grounds, Shamdasani said, citing information gleaned from sources on the ground including a man who played dead during a mass execution.

Public executions were being carried out for “treason and collaboration” with Iraqi forces trying to recapture the city,
or for the use of banned mobile phones or desertion.

People with explosive belts, possibly teenagers or young boys, were being deployed in the alleys of Old Mosul, while
abducted women were being “distributed” to fighters or told they would be used to accompany Islamic State convoys, she said.

(Reporting by Tom Miles and Stephanie Nebehay)

Exclusive: Watchdog condemns Syrian government, Islamic State use of banned chemical weapons

car parts to make car bombs

By Anthony Deutsch

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – The executive body of the global chemical weapons watchdog voted on Friday to condemn the use of banned toxic agents by the Syrian government and by militant group Islamic State, a source who took part in the closed session said.

Roughly two-thirds of the 41 members on the Executive Council of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), endorsed a U.S.-tabled text, the source told Reuters.

The OPCW’s Executive Council, which meets behind closed doors, seldom votes on such matters, generally operating through consensus. But this text was supported by 28 members, including Germany, France, the United States and Britain.

It was opposed by Russia, China, Sudan and Iran. There were nine abstentions. Russia and Iran are Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main allies against rebels seeking to overthrow him. Western and Gulf Arab states back the rebels.

The U.S.-Russian split over Syria was striking as it was those two countries that in 2013 took the lead in getting the Damascus government to join the OPCW and avert threatened U.S.-led military intervention in Syria’s civil war.

A 13-month international inquiry by the OPCW and United Nations concluded in a series of reports that Syrian government forces, including helicopter squadrons, were responsible for the use of chlorine barrel bombs against civilians.

The OPCW-U.N. mission found that the Syrian government carried out three toxic attacks in March and April of last year, while Islamic State militants had used sulfur mustard gas.

The findings set the stage for a U.N. Security Council showdown between the five veto-wielding powers, likely pitting Russia and China against the United States, Britain and France over how those responsible for the attacks should be held accountable.

Syrian authorities deny having used chemical weapons in the conflict. Islamic State has not commented.

(Reporting by Anthony Deutsch; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

U.S. expects I.S. to wield chemical weapons in Monsol

A fighter of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) holds an ISIL flag and a weapon on a street in the city of Mosul

By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States expects Islamic State to use crude chemical weapons as it tries to repel an Iraqi-led offensive on the city of Mosul, U.S. officials say, although adding that the group’s technical ability to develop such weapons is highly limited.

U.S. forces have begun to regularly collect shell fragments to test for possible chemical agents, given Islamic State’s use of mustard agent in the months before Monday’s launch of the Mosul offensive, one official said.

In a previously undisclosed incident, U.S. forces confirmed the presence of a sulfur mustard agent on Islamic State munition fragments on Oct. 5, a second official said. The Islamic State had targeted local forces, not U.S. or coalition troops.

“Given ISIL’s reprehensible behavior and flagrant disregard for international standards and norms, this event is not surprising,” the second official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity, and using an acronym for Islamic State.

U.S. officials do not believe Islamic State has been successful so far at developing chemical weapons with particularly lethal effects, meaning that conventional weapons are still the most dangerous threat for advancing Iraqi and Kurdish forces – and any foreign advisers who get close enough.

Sulfur mustard agents can cause blistering on exposed skin and lungs. At low doses, however, that would not be deadly.

Roughly 5,000 U.S. forces are in Iraq. More than 100 of them are embedded with Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces involved with the Mosul offensive, advising commanders and helping them ensure coalition air power hits the right targets, officials said. Still, those forces are not at the front lines, they added.

Iraqi security forces advance in Qayara, south of Mosul, to attack Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq

Iraqi security forces advance in Qayara, south of Mosul, to attack Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq, October 18, 2016. REUTERS/Stringer

HUMAN SHIELDS

The fall of Mosul would signal the defeat of the ultra-hardline Sunni jihadists in Iraq but could also lead to land grabs and sectarian bloodletting between groups that fought one another after the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

U.S. President Barack Obama estimated on Thursday that perhaps 1 million civilians were still in Mosul, creating a challenge for Iraq and its Western backers trying to expel the group through force.

“If we aren’t successful in helping ordinary people as they’re fleeing from ISIL, then that makes us vulnerable to seeing ISIL return,” Obama told reporters in Washington.

The International Organization for Migration’s Iraq chief, Thomas Weiss, said on Tuesday he expected Islamic State militants to use Mosul residents as human shields and lent his voice to concerns about the dangers of chemical agents.

The IOM had not managed to procure many gas masks yet, despite those risks, Weiss said from Baghdad.

“We also fear, and there has been some evidence that ISIL might be using chemical weapons. Children, the elderly, disabled, will be particularly vulnerable,” Weiss said.

Attacking Iraqi forces are still 12 to 30 miles (20 to 50 km) from the city itself and U.S. officials believe that Islamic State is most likely to use chemical weapons later in the campaign, in what could be a difficult, protracted battle.

The leader of Islamic State was reported to be among thousands of hardline militants still in the city, suggesting the group would go to great lengths to repel the coalition.

American officials believe some of Islamic State’s best fighters are in Mosul.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Suspected Aleppo chlorine attack chokes dozens, rescue workers

A still image taken on September 7, 2016 from a video posted on social media said to be shot in Aleppo's Al Sukari on September 6, 2016, shows a boy breathing with an oxygen mask inside a hospital, after a suspected chlorine gas attack

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A suspected chlorine gas attack on an opposition-held neighborhood in the Syrian city of Aleppo caused dozens of cases of suffocation on Tuesday, rescue workers and a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Civil Defence, a rescue workers’ organization that operates in rebel-held areas, said government helicopters had dropped barrel bombs containing chlorine on the Sukari neighborhood in eastern Aleppo.

The Syrian government has denied previous accusations it used chemical weapons during the five-year-old civil war. The Syrian army could not be immediately reached for comment on the latest allegations.

The Civil Defence said on its Facebook page that 80 people had suffocated. It reported no deaths. It posted a video showing wheezing children doused in water using oxygen masks to breathe.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks Syrian violence using sources on the ground, said medical sources had reported 70 cases of suffocation.

A United Nations and Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons inquiry seen by Reuters last month found that Syrian government forces were responsible for two toxic gas attacks in 2014 and 2015 involving chlorine.

A still image taken on September 7, 2016 from a video posted on social media said to be shot in Aleppo's Al Sukari on September 6, 2016, shows a civil defense member making his way through debris, after a suspected chlorine gas attack,

A still image taken on September 7, 2016 from a video posted on social media said to be shot in Aleppo’s Al Sukari on September 6, 2016, shows a civil defense member making his way through debris, after a suspected chlorine gas attack, Syria. Social Media via Reuters TV

The Civil Defence accused the government of two other suspected chlorine gas attacks in August . The United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Syria said it was investigating an August incident.

“Unimaginable crimes are occurring in Aleppo … pro-government aerial bombardments cause mass civilian casualties,” Commission Chairman Paulo Pinheiro told reporters in Geneva. “In government-held areas, indiscriminate ground shelling (by) armed groups … is also killing scores of civilians,” he added.

Aleppo has been one of the areas hardest hit by escalating violence in recent months after the collapse of a partial truce brokered by the United States and Russia in February.

Government forces put eastern Aleppo under siege on Sunday for a second time since July after advancing against rebels on the city’s outskirts. The city has long been divided between government and opposition areas of control.

The Syrian conflict has killed more than 250,000 people and forced more than 11 million from their homes.

(Reporting by John Davison; additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva.; Editing by Larry King)

Suspected Aleppo chlorine attack chokes dozens, rescue workers

Children play along a street in the rebel-held al-Sheikh Said neighbourhood of Aleppo, Syria

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A suspected chlorine gas attack on an opposition-held neighborhood in the Syrian city of Aleppo caused dozens of cases of suffocation on Tuesday, rescue workers and a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Civil Defence, a rescue workers’ organization that operates in rebel-held areas, said government helicopters had dropped barrel bombs containing chlorine on the Sukari neighborhood in eastern Aleppo.

The Syrian government has denied previous accusations it used chemical weapons during the five-year-old civil war. The Syrian army could not be immediately reached for comment on the latest allegations.

The Civil Defence said on its Facebook page that 80 people had suffocated. It reported no deaths. It posted a video showing wheezing children doused in water using oxygen masks to breathe.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks Syrian violence using sources on the ground, said medical sources had reported 70 cases of suffocation.

A United Nations and Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons inquiry seen by Reuters last month found that Syrian government forces were responsible for two toxic gas attacks in 2014 and 2015 involving chlorine.

The Civil Defence accused the government of two other suspected chlorine gas attacks in August . The United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Syria said it was investigating an August incident.

“Unimaginable crimes are occurring in Aleppo … pro-government aerial bombardments cause mass civilian casualties,” Commission Chairman Paulo Pinheiro told reporters in Geneva. “In government-held areas, indiscriminate ground shelling (by) armed groups … is also killing scores of civilians,” he added.

Aleppo has been one of the areas hardest hit by escalating violence in recent months after the collapse of a partial truce brokered by the United States and Russia in February.

Government forces put eastern Aleppo under siege on Sunday for a second time since July after advancing against rebels on the city’s outskirts. The city has long been divided between government and opposition areas of control.

The Syrian conflict has killed more than 250,000 people and forced more than 11 million from their homes.

(Reporting by John Davison; additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva.; Editing by Larry King)

Rescuers say toxic gas dropped on Syrian town where Russian helicopter shot down

Video of people affected by chemical attack

By Lisa Barrington

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A Syrian rescue service operating in rebel-held territory said on Tuesday a helicopter dropped containers of toxic gas overnight on a town close to where a Russian military helicopter had been shot down hours earlier.

The opposition Syrian National Coalition (SNC) accused President Bashar al-Assad of being behind the attack. Assad has denied previous accusations of using chemical weapons.

A spokesman for the Syria Civil Defence said 33 people, mostly women and children, were affected by the gas, which they suspect was chlorine, in Saraqeb, in rebel-held Idlib province.

The group, which describes itself as a neutral band of search and rescue volunteers, posted a video on YouTube apparently showing a number of men struggling to breathe and being given oxygen masks by people in civil defense uniforms.

“Medium-sized barrels fell containing toxic gases. The Syrian Civil Defence was not able to determine the type of the gas,” said the spokesman.

The Syrian government and its Russian allies were not immediately available for comment.

Later, state news agency SANA said rebels had fired rockets armed with toxic gas on the government-held old quarter of Aleppo city, killing five people and causing eight breathing difficulties. It gave no further details. Rebels have denied previous accusations of using chemical weapons.

The SNC said of the reported use of poison gas in Saraqeb: “After shelling, besieging and killing civilians and perpetrating war crimes on them, the Assad regime has resorted once again, and in breach of UN resolutions 2118 and 2235, to using chemical substances and toxic gases.

“The daily reality confirms that all the international agreements and previous security council decisions, be they about chemical weapons or otherwise, are meaningless for the Assad regime.”

The Civil Defence spokesman said it was the second time Saraqeb had been hit by toxic gas. The group was aware of around nine suspected chlorine gas incidents across Idlib province since the conflict began, he said.

The U.S. State Department said it was looking into the reported use of chemical weapons in Saraqeb.

“I’m not in a position to confirm the veracity of (the reports),” said spokesman John Kirby. “Certainly, if it’s true, it would be extremely serious.”

Monitors at the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks violence on all sides in the civil war, said barrel bombs fell on Saraqeb late on Monday, wounding a large number of citizens.

Russia’s defense ministry said a Russian helicopter was shot down near Saraqeb during the day on Monday, killing all five people on board, in the biggest officially acknowledged loss of life for Russian forces since they started operations in Syria.

DENIALS

The helicopter came down roughly mid-way between Aleppo and Russia’s main air base at Hmeimim in the western province of Latakia, near the Mediterranean coast.

Russian air power began supporting Syrian President Bashar al Assad late last year, an intervention which tipped the balance of the war in Assad’s favor, eroding gains the rebels had made that year.

No group has claimed responsibility for downing the Mi-8 military transport helicopter.

Government and opposition forces have both denied using chemical weapons during the five-year-old civil war. Western powers say the government has been responsible for chlorine and other chemical attacks. The government and Russia have accused rebels of using poison gas.

U.N. investigators established that sarin gas was used in Eastern Ghouta in 2013. The United States accused Damascus of that attack, which it estimates killed 1,429 people, including at least 426 children. Damascus denied responsibility, and blamed rebels.

Later that year the United Nations and the Syrian government agreed to destroy the state’s declared stockpile of chemical weapons, a process completed in January 2016.

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons confirmed in late 2015 that sulfur mustard, commonly known as mustard gas, had been used for the first time in the conflict, without saying which party in the many sided conflict it thought had used it.

(Additional reporting by Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Editing by Samia Nakhoul and Robin Pomeroy)