France, Britain offer evidence of ‘multiple’ uses of nerve gas in Syria
PARIS — France and Britain announced Tuesday that laboratory tests had confirmed that sarin nerve gas had been used “multiple times” in Syria but only “in a localized way.”
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said that in one case, at least, “there is no doubt it was the regime and its accomplices” that used the gas.
In a statement, Fabius said samples of body fluids taken from victims in Syria and tested at a French laboratory — including urine samples carried out of Syria by French reporters — “prove the presence of sarin,” a poisonous nerve gas.
“It would be unacceptable that those guilty of these crimes can benefit from impunity,” Fabius said, without specifying of whom he spoke. But sarin is in the Syrian government’s stock of chemical weapons, and he later told France 2 television that blood samples from victims of a helicopter attack in April in Idlib province left no doubt that it was the government that had used sarin.
“We are aware of the entire chain, from when the attack took place to when the people were killed and the samples taken,” he said.
Fabius handed France’s evidence to Ake Sellstrom, the chief of the mission of inquiry appointed by UN Secretary-General Ban Kimoon. Britain and France have asked Ban to investigate various charges of the use of chemical weapons in Syria.
The French announcement offered the clearest evidence so far that sarin had been used in the Syria conflict, which has lasted more than two years and left more than 80,000 people dead. Israeli officials have cited but not revealed evidence that the government of President Bashar Assad has repeatedly used chemical weapons, and the White House has said that US intelligence agencies have determined with varying degrees of confidence that it used sarin on a small scale.
UN investigators in Geneva on Tuesday also reported the likely use of chemical weapons in Syria, in a report focusing on “new levels of brutality.”