SyriaRussia: Syria rebels used sarin gas

Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s UN ambassador, announced at a UN news conference Tuesday that scientific analysis by Russian labs of a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria on 19 March concluded the attack probably had been carried out by rebels using sarin nerve gas of “cottage industry” quality. He said the gas was delivered by a crudely made missile.

The finding by Russia, President Bashar al-Assad regime’s staunchest supporter, contradicted conclusions reached separately by independent labs in the United Kingdom and France, by the U.S. intelligence community, and by the UN own investigative commission, that it was the Syrian government forces who used sarin.

Also, the Russian analysis dealt with only one incident of chemical weapon use, while the conclusions of the Western countries and the UN are based on six incidents of gas use – two each in December 2012, March 2013, and April 2013.

Churkin said the evidence for the Russian analysis was based on evidence collected directly by Russian forensics specialists who had been permitted by the Syrian government to visit the site, Khan al-Assal in northern Syria.

The New York Times reports that the Khan al-Assal attack, in which at least twenty-six people died, has been at the center of a propaganda war between supporters and opponents of Assad, with each side accusing the other of using chemical weapons. The Syrian government denied the UN investigative team, and independent labs, access to the sites of the alleged attacks, including Khan al-Assal.

Last month the Obama administration said it had concluded that Syrian forces had used chemical weapons “on a small scale against the opposition multiple times in the last year,” not only in Khan al-Assal but elsewhere, including the Damascus suburbs, in attacks that had killed 100 to 150 people.

The Times notes that the U.S. conclusion was based on indirectly obtained soil samples and interviews with survivors, as well as the Syrian insurgency’s lack of technical ability and materials to carry out a chemical weapons attack. The conclusions of the French and British labs was based on bodily fluids from victims of the attacks. The fluids were sent to the labs by Turkish doctors who treated some of the victims in Turkey, and by Syrian physicians who collected the fluids from dead and wounded victims in Syrian hospitals.

Churkin said the Russian investigators had found evidence of crudely manufactured sarin,  delivered by an unguided projectile with a crude explosive charge. “This was like a cottage-industry product, manufactured at a simple facility,” Churkin said. “There is every reason to believe that it was armed opposition fighters who used the chemical weapons in Khan al-Assal.”

Churkin said the 80-page Russian analysis was accompanied by chemical formulas and graphs. He  said he would be forwarding copies to his American, French, and British counterparts. “I hope they find it persuasive,” he said.

The acting American ambassador to the UN, Rosemary DiCarlo, speaking to reporters later, said she had not seen the Russian analysis, “but we will certainly study it carefully when we do receive it.” She repeated the U.S. demand that Syria allow the panel of experts appointed by the United Nations to enter the country and “investigate any and all credible allegations.”