UN inspectors confirm Syria chemical attack

Chemical weapons were probably used in four locations in Syria this year, in addition to the confirmed attack near Damascus in August that forced the government to abandon its secret chemical stockpile, U.N. inspectors have said. ● In a report released Thursday, the experts, led by Swedish professor Ake Sellstrom, examined seven alleged chemical weapons attacks and said it lacked information to corroborate the allegations at two locations. The inspectors’ limited mandate barred them from identifying whether the government or opposition fighters were responsible for any of the attacks. Thursday’s report said evidence indicated chemical weapons were probably used in Khan al Assal outside Aleppo, Jobar in Damascus’ eastern suburbs, Saraqueb near Idlib in the northwest, and Ashrafiah Sahnaya in the Damascus countryside. In two cases, it found ‘‘signatures of sarin.’’ The government and opposition accused each other of using chemical weapons at Khan al Assal and the report said none of the parties in Syria denied their use in the village. The allegations of chemical weapons use at Jobar and Ashrafiah Sahnaya were made by the Syrian government, while Britain and France raised the allegations about Saraqueb.

Al Arabiya News: UN: chemical arms used 5 times in Syria

Patrick O’Connor: UN Syrian chemical weapons report exposes Washington’s lies ■ The release of a United Nations chemical weapons inspectors’ report pointing to multiple sarin gas attacks carried out by so-called “rebel” forces further exposes the Obama administration’s lies about Syrian government responsibility for an August 21 chemical shelling of the Ghouta area outside of Damascus. Washington seized on the incident as the pretext for a planned bombing campaign and stepped-up drive for regime-change against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The UN report’s appearance last Thursday follows the publication of Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh’s detailed article in the London Review of Books revealing that the Obama administration deliberately manipulated intelligence to falsely assert it had proof of Syrian government and military responsibility for the Ghouta attack. Hersh cited current and former US military and intelligence officials on the falsification of intelligence regarding the August 21 attack as well as the Obama administration’s concealment of the existence of intelligence reports warning that the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al Nusra Front militia had the capacity to manufacture and weaponise the nerve gas sarin used in the Ghouta attack.