Syria strikes - as it happened: UN security team shot at in Douma, says chemical weapons watchdog

Inspectors' access to site still being delayed, reports say

Corbyn leads debate into Parliament vote on Syria strikes: 'The government is attempting to overturn a democratic advance'

A UN security team came under fire in Syria while doing reconnaissance for inspectors to visit sites of a suspected chemical weapons attack, and officials said it was no longer clear when the inspectors would be able to go in.

The inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) are in Syria to investigate an April 7 incident in which Western countries and rescue workers say scores of civilians were gassed to death by government forces.

OPCW Director-General Ahmet Üzümcü said the United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS) had decided to carry out reconnaissance at two sites in the town of Douma before the inspectors would visit them.

“On arrival at site one, a large crowd gathered and the advice provided by the UNDSS was that the reconnaissance team should withdraw,” he told a meeting at the watchdog’s headquarters in remarks it later released. “At site two, the team came under small arms fire and an explosive was detonated. The reconnaissance team returned to Damascus.”

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US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis blamed the Syrian government for delays in inspectors reaching the sites and said it has a history of trying to “clean up the evidence before the investigation team gets in.”

“We are very much aware of the delay that the regime imposed on that delegation but we are also very much aware of how they have operated in the past and seal what they have done using chemical weapons,” Mr Mattis said before the start of a meeting with his counterpart from Qatar.

The United States, Britain and France fired missiles at Syrian targets on Saturday in retaliation for the suspected chemical use. They say the arrival of the inspectors is being held up by Syrian authorities who now control the area, and that evidence of the chemical attack may be being destroyed.

Damascus and its ally Moscow deny that any gas attack took place, that they are holding up the inspections or that they have tampered with evidence at the site. Britain’s ambassador to the OPCW Peter Wilson said it was now unclear when the inspectors would be able to reach it.

The rebel group based in Douma announced its surrender hours after the suspected chemical attack, and the last rebels left a week later, hours after the Western retaliation strikes.

The US-led intervention has threatened to escalate confrontation between the West and Bashar al-Assad’s backer Russia, although it has had no impact on the fighting on the ground, in which pro-government forces have pressed on with a campaign to crush the rebellion.

Mr Assad is now in his strongest position since the early months of a seven-year-old civil war that has killed more than 500,000 people and driven more than half of Syrians from their homes.

The OPCW team will seek evidence from soil samples, interviews with witnesses, blood, urine or tissue samples from victims and weapon parts. But, more than a week after the suspected attack, hard evidence might be hard to trace.

An official close to the Syrian government said the UN security team had been met by protesters demonstrating against the US-led strikes.

“It was a message from the people,” said the official. The mission “will continue its work”, the official said.

Douma was the last town to hold out in the besieged eastern Ghouta enclave, the last big rebel bastion near the capital Damascus. Eastern Ghouta was captured by a government advance over the past two months.

Syria’s UN ambassador said on Tuesday the fact-finding mission would begin its work in Douma on Wednesday if the U.N. security team deemed the situation there safe.

The Syrian “White Helmets” rescue organisation, which operates in rebel-held areas, has pinpointed for the OPCW team the places where victims of the suspected attack are buried, its head Raed Saleh said on Wednesday.

Douma hospital workers who stayed in the town after the army recaptured it have said that none of the people injured on the night of the attack were exposed to chemical weapons.

Reuters

Key Points

• Russian foreign minister to hold talks with UN's Syria peace envoy
• Greater US military involvement 'not going to happen', says senator
• More diplomatic clashes in UN Security Council meeting

[18 April 2018 10:40 · Jon Sharman]

Here, Tom Peck sketches yesterday's goings-on in parliament:

[18 April 2018 11:00 · Jon Sharman]

International chemical weapons inspectors do not appear to have visited the site of a suspected attack in Syria after days of delays by Syrian and Russian authorities.

Syrian state media reported on Tuesday that inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons had entered the town of Douma.

Syria's UN ambassador, Bashar Ja'afari, later said only a UN advance security team had entered.

The US State Department has accused the Syrian government and its ally Russia of trying to cover up the alleged April 7 attack.

Spokeswoman Heather Nauert said the US did not believe the inspectors had entered Douma, and that the evidence is at risk of decaying as delays drag on.

There was no comment from the OPCW or the UN on Wednesday.

​AP

[18 April 2018 11:15 · Jon Sharman]

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov will hold talks with Staffan de Mistura, the UN's Syria peace envoy, on Friday, the RIA news agency reported, citing the foreign ministry.

"I confirm that these talks are planned for Friday," foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.

[18 April 2018 12:04 · Jon Sharman]

The UN security team sent into Douma ahead of OPCW inspectors was shot at, according to the watchdog's head.

[18 April 2018 12:21 · Jon Sharman]

Ahmet Üzümcü, the director general of the OPCW, has said the UN security team sent into Douma ahead of chemical weapons inspectors has been forced to withdraw, Reuters reports.

It will further delay the inspectors' access to the site of an alleged poison gas attack on 7 April.

It is not yet clear who shot at the security team.

[18 April 2018 12:48 · Jon Sharman]

Syrian troops and allied Palestinian fighters are massing around the last Isis bastion in the capital, preparing for an all-out offensive if talks on an evacuation deal fall through.

The extremists seized most of the Yarmouk refugee camp in 2015 after months of heavy fighting.

The built-up residential area on the southern edge of Damascus was once home to some 200,000 Palestinians, mainly refugees from the 1948 war with Israel and their descendants — as well as tens of thousands of middle-class Syrians.

Today there are some 2,500 Isis fighters in Yarmouk and nearby neighborhoods, according to Khaled Abdul-Majid, a leader of the government-allied Palestinian Resistance Factions Coalition.

He said the battle would begin within days if the militants do not agree to be evacuated. 

​AP

[18 April 2018 13:15 · Jon Sharman]

The use of chemical weapons in Syria and the UK is a "serious threat" to the convention outlawing the agents' use, Britain's envoy to the OPCW has said.

Peter Wilson told a meeting of the group's executive council on Wednesday: "In the past 14 months, we have seen the use of chemical weapons in Syria, in Iraq, in Malaysia and now in the United Kingdom.

"This is a serious threat to the convention. It is a threat to the rules-based system, and therefore, a threat to every State Party.

"There is no place for chemical weapons use in the 21st century. Not anywhere. And certainly not by a State Party to this convention.

"These actions demand a response. There is an urgent need to act, collectively, to reinforce the prohibition against the development, production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons.

"Those who choose to ignore these prohibitions, and use chemical weapons, should be identified and held to account – no matter who they are, or how long that may take. There can be no impunity."

[18 April 2018 13:30 · Jon Sharman]

Syrian state media say rebels in a town northeast of Damascus are handing over their weapons as part of an agreement reached with the Syrian government.

Al-Ikhbariya TV says the fighters from the Army of Islam rebel group and their families have begun evacuating the town of Dumayr, bound for opposition-held areas in the north as part of the agreement. The Syrian military would then enter the town.

It says the total number of evacuees has reached 5,000, including 1,500 gunmen. It also showed footage of what it says are weapons handed over to the Syrian military.

Dumayr is near the eastern Ghouta region, which came under full government control last week after a weeks-long offensive and an alleged chemical weapons attack.

​AP

[18 April 2018 13:39 · Jon Sharman]

It is not clear when OPCW inspectors will be able to access the site of an alleged chemical attack in Douma, the UK envoy to the body has said.

Peter Wilson reiterated the words of Ahmet Üzümcü, who said earlier that a UN security team sent ahead of the inspectors had come under fire.

[18 April 2018 13:48 · Jon Sharman]

France has pledged €50m toward humanitarian aid for Syria.

Emmanuel Macron tweeted the contribution would be made following a meeting with non-governmental organisations in Paris.

Groups including Action Against Hunger, Handicap International, the Red Cross, and Care were present.

The UN estimates that some 13 million people, including six million children, are in need of humanitarian aid in Syria due to the seven-year-long war.