Nebenzia: Some blatantly ignore the use of chemical weapons by terrorists in Syria

Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia reiterated that all incidents in which the Syrian government was accused of using chemical weapons were fabricated and provoked.

He noted that Syria had fulfilled all its obligations and destroyed its chemical weapons arsenal.

“Syria has no intention and, more importantly, has no clear or ambiguous reasons for the use of chemical weapons,” Nebenzia said during a UN Security Council session via video on Thursday about the situation in the Middle East.

He added that “the fact that terrorist groups used chemical weapons in Syria is blatantly and deliberately ignored.”

In 2013, Syria sent more than 200 letters to the UN General Secretariat on preparing and carrying out chemical terrorism by terrorists and no further action was taken based on this information, the Russian diplomat noted.

On September 3, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a news briefing that the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) continues to procrastinate on the investigation of chemical attacks in Syria.

“We state once again that the OPCW Technical Secretariat continues to use far-fetched pretexts to procrastinate on the investigation of chemical attacks by terrorist groups, although Damascus regularly informs the OPCW and the UN Security Council about such cases,” she said.
  SANA