DM Monitoring
Moscow: The Bashar Assad regime and its main backer Russia faced renewed pressure over allegations of chemical weapons use as member countries of the global toxic arms watchdog met on Monday.
While Moscow was urged by Western nations to “transparently” reveal the circumstances of the Novichok nerve agent poisoning of opposition figure Alexei Navalny, Damascus faced calls for sanctions at the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) after investigators accused the Syrian regime of sarin attacks in 2017. Russia and the Syrian regime have repeatedly denied the accusations, alleging that Western powers have politicized the Hague-based OPCW. The Syrian regime had failed to meet the 90-day deadline set in July to declare the weapons used in the 2017 attacks on the village of Ltamenah and to reveal its remaining stocks, OPCW chief Fernando Arias said.
“The Syrian Arab Republic has not completed any of the measures,” Arias told the meeting as quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“Gaps, inconsistencies and discrepancies” remained in the regime’s account of its progress on its 2013 agreement to give up all chemical weapons following a suspected sarin attack that killed 1,400 people in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta, he said.
In April, the global chemical weapons watchdog issued a report blaming the Syrian regime for a series of chemical attacks using sarin and chlorine in late March 2017 on the central town of Ltamenah.
The report marked the first time the Investigation and Identification Team, set up in 2018 by the OPCW, has apportioned blame for an attack in Syria. France proposed Monday that the OPCW should “suspend the rights and privileges” of the Syrian regime for failing to meet the deadline, French ambassador Luis Vassy said, adding that the proposal was backed by 43 states. These would include the regime’s voting rights in the OPCW, depriving it of a voice at a body where it has been deflecting allegations of toxic arms use for years.
Russia meanwhile came under pressure over the poisoning of Navalny in August. Navalny himself and Western governments have blamed the attack on the Kremlin.
