Syria denies using chemical weapons in civil war
Date
11/30/2015 12:06:20 PM
Syria on Monday denied ever using chemical weapons in its four-year-old civil war telling a global watchdog it was cooperating fully with the destruction of its toxic stockpile.
Damascus's rebuttal comes amid growing accusations it is not being transparent with the world's chemical watchdog and UN efforts are stepped up to track down the perpetrators of deadly chlorine gas attacks in the war-torn country last year.
"We wish here to state categorically that we have never used chlorine or any other toxic chemicals during any incidents or any other operations in the Syrian Arab Republic since the beginning of the crisis and up to this very day" Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Moqdad told the annual meeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Damascus rejected "the false accusations against Syria with respect to its supposed use of chlorine as a weapon in military operations" he added speaking in Arabic through an interpreter.
The accusations "only serve political agendas which also aim at diverting our successes in eliminating our chemical weapons" Moqdad said.
AFP