Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Keep quiet or else
Doctors threatened at gunpoint to stop them talking of chemical attack Government accused of enabling Assad to launder his dirty cash in UK
DOCTORS have been told at gunpoint they must say there was no chemical weapons attack in Douma or else their children will be killed.
Labour MP Geraint Davies yesterday told a major Commons debate on Syria about the shocking threats being issued.
It came as the Government was accused of enabling Syrian dictator Bashar al-assad to launder “dirty money” through the UK.
Speaking of the warnings given to medics, Swansea West MP Mr Davies said: “A Syrian doctor in Swansea approached me to say that his wife’s family... were under a gas attack where their two-year-old died in front of them.
“He’s now telling me that doctors in Douma are saying Syrians, at the point of a gun, are saying, ‘Unless you give a testimony, doctor, that there wasn’t a gas attack, we’ll be killing your children’.”
Syria and its ally Russia deny responsibility for the April 7 assault, in which up to 75 people were killed.
Video footage and witness testimony suggests gas seeped down into basements, suffocating the victims.
Russia finally gave inspectors from the Organisation for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons the green light to visit Douma. The team, expected to arrive today, has been in the country since Saturday.
It was prohibited from entering the town, near capital Damascus, as Russia and Syria claimed there were “pending security issues to be worked out”, but US officials fear the site was tampered with.
US ambassador Kenneth Ward said: “It is our understanding the Russians may have visited the attack site. It is our concern that they may have tampered with it, with the intent of thwarting the efforts of the OPCW fact-finding mission to conduct an effective investigation.”
France’s foreign ministry said it was “very likely that proof and essential
elements are disappearing from this site”. But Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov insisted: “I can guarantee Russia has not tampered with the site.”
Meanwhile, Labour’s John Mcdonnell accused Chancellor Philip Hammond of failing to seize a single penny from Assad regime figures based in Britain.
Mr Mcdonnell told the Commons: “It is estimated that there are over £5billion worth of assets owned by Assad and his associates held overseas.
“According to international reports, the UK is recouping far less from these individuals linked to the Syrian regime in corrupt assets than other countries.” Pointing to Spanish authorities seizing £500million of assets, he went on: “So far, no unexplained wealth orders have been used against Syrian regime figures.
“The Government promised to introduce a date for a register of owners of UK properties based overseas back in 2015. We’re now told the register will not be published until 2021.”
The Chancellor vowed to take immediate action and said he will consider bringing forward measures. It came as the row continued over the Prime Minister failing to consult MPS over airstrikes in Syria. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn accused Theresa May of “tossing aside” the convention for foreign interventions as it was “inconvenient”. The PM said she made a statement to Parliament “at the first opportunity”. She was also forced to deny claims she had manipulated pro-bombing Labour MPS by showing them secret intelligence. Hitting back at suggestions US President Donald Trump had more of a say than Parliament, Mrs May added: “Let no one in this House be in any doubt that neither I nor this Government take instructions from any president or any other government.”
It came as diplomats from three Baltic states warned MPS that Russian forces were lined up along NATO’S border, ready for assault operations.
Latvian ambassador Baiba Braze told the Commons Defence Committee: “Just 32km from our border there is a big increase in Russia’s newest helicopters and there is a special helicopter base that was redeveloped and fully equipped.
“Those are assault capabilities, not defensive capabilities.”
She added: “In the Western military district there are more than 100,000 Russian soldiers, far beyond what would be necessary for a defence effort”
MPS also heard Russia’s Spetsnaz special forces were 70km from the border with Estonia, where some 800 British soldiers are based.
Lithuanian ambassador Renatus Norkus said: “Without the presence on the ground of allied troops it would be very, very hard to do anything in terms of defence.”
The CDC was taking evidence ahead of the Modernising Defence Programme armed forces review, due before July.