Syrian government forces were blamed for two toxic gas attacks and Islamic State militants were found to have used sulfur mustard gas after a joint investigation by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
Syria continues to deny it uses chemical weapons.
‘The most serious violation’
Countries that are signatories to the Chemical Weapons Convention are meeting in The Hague. “For the first time in the convention’s 19-year history, a state party has been found to have violated the treaty’s most fundamental tenet,” Canadian representative Sabine Noelke said, as reported by Canadian Press.
Australia’s ambassador to the Netherlands is said to have called chemical attacks in Syria “the most serious violation of the chemical weapons convention in its history.”
Report goes to Security Council
The joint report is to be discussed in the UN Security Council next week. Any discussion of consequences is likely to pit the five veto-wielding countries against each other, with Russia and China on one side and the U.S., Britain and France on the other.
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