Syrian family’s poison gas horror

BEIRUT: A group monitoring the Syrian civil war yesterday said government forces carried out a poison gas attack that killed six people in the northwest, and medics posted videos of children suffering from “suffocation”.

A Syrian military source described the report of an attack in the village of Sarmin in Idlib province as propaganda. “We confirm that we would not use this type of weapon, and we don’t need to use it,” the source said.

President Bashar al-Assad’s government has previously denied accusations that it has used chemical weapons against rebel-held areas in the four-year-old war.

Officials were not available for comment. An army statement said dozens of militants were killed in other areas of Idlib province overnight.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks the conflict through a network of sources, said the six dead included a man, his wife and their three children.

It cited medical sources saying they died as a result of gas from barrel bombs dropped late on Monday and that the chemical used was probably chlorine.

Dozens more were wounded in the attack, the observatory said. Reuters could not independently verify the report.

The Idlib branch of the Syrian Civil Defence rescue organisation, which operates in insurgent-held areas, posted seven videos on YouTube, some at night-time and some in a medical centre.

One video showed three children and a woman, all apparently unconscious, in a medical centre. A voice offcamera said the name of the village was Sarmin and gave Monday’s date.

“One of the infants, only a few months old,” a male voice says, shaking, as he films a baby on a gurney with liquid around its mouth. Two more infants with limp bodies are brought in, one by a man wearing a gas mask and another carrying a young girl.

“She’s still alive doctor,” says a man checking the girl. “Doctor, doctor! She is still breathing.”

Another video, shot at night, showed a young girl, naked except for underwear and pink shoes, being doused in liquid by people wearing white helmets, her horrified expression illuminated by their headlamps shining on her face.

We confirm that we would not use this type of weapon, and we don’t need to use it