That, however, is something that neither the militias wreaking havoc on the ancient land of Syria, nor their foreign sponsors, aiming to spread chaos in yet another Arab country, desire. Apparently Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan were not enough for them, and they will use any methods, including chemical weapons, to thwart the arrival of peace and stability in Syria. For example, the Syrian regime has accused the terrorists of carrying out chemical attacks in the village of Kfar Zeit in the province of Hama in western Syria. Syrian state television reported that the Jabhat al-Nusra group, affiliated with the international terrorist network Al-Qaida, took responsibility for the spraying of chlorine gas in the region. Two people died as a result and an additional 100 contracted varying degrees of poisoning.
Syrian opposition sources in turn informed the television network Al-Arabia that at least five people had died in the suburbs of Damascus as a result of a chemical attack they claim was perpetrated by the army of Bashar Assad. Their deaths were the result of poisonous gases, which also injured dozens of people. Other sources, however, have yet to confirm these accusations of the use of chemical weapons. In fact, the report of these charges was circulated by Western mass media outlets with rather suspicious haste and ubiquity. Meanwhile, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney had nothing to report beyond making threats and assertions that that the US is carefully watching each move by the Syrian regime, in particular with regard to the use of chemical weapons.
It is important to remind the “forgetful” politicians in the White House that Syria previously directed a letter to the United Nations in which it declared that opposition groups were planning a poison gas attack in the vicinity of Damascus, with the intent of blaming government security forces for it afterward. In the letter dated 25 March, released by the United Nations only last week, i.e., after the incident, Syrian UN Ambassador Bashar Jaafari declared that security forces had managed to intercept “conversations among the terrorists” which showed that a certain Abu Nadir was secretly dispensing gas masks to militants in the region of Jubar, which is held by insurgents.
Furthermore, it is a well-known fact that the Assad regime, regardless of all of the obstacles created by the militants, is fulfilling its obligations to destroy its chemical weapons with diligence and thoroughness. “After a forced interruption related to forays by the radical armed opposition in the regions of the Latakia province along the Turkish border, the Syrian authorities have resumed evacuation of their chemical weapons components and precursors. On 4 April a successive shipment of chemicals, weighing more than 64 tons, was delivered to the port of the city of Latakia. Thus, around 59% of all of Syria’s stockpiles of toxic materials have at present been removed and destroyed in storage locations,” says a statement by the Foreign Ministry of the Russian Federation, posted on its official website.
The interruption of the removal of chemical materials was necessary due to the real threat of vehicular convoys posed by extremists and the impossibility of guaranteeing their safe passage en route. “Under current circumstances we have been actively working with the countries involved to get them to use all of their influence on the armed opposition to facilitate the normalization of the situation in the region of Latakia and the implementation of the approved OPCW plan for the removal of chemical weapons components from Syria,” noted the Foreign Ministry of the Russian Federation.
Damascus has now prepared the next shipment of chemical weapons and their components for removal from Syria and subsequent destruction. At a closed session of the UN Security Council, Sigrid Kaag, head of the joint UN and OPCW mission in Syria, announced this development to members of the UN Security Council via videoconference from Damascus, where she is currently located. According to Kaag’s statement, 72 containers of chemical materials have been placed in three different facilities. After they have been removed from the country, the declared chemical arsenal of Syria may be said to have been 90% destroyed.
Russia is playing an active role in the removal of Syria’s chemical weapons. From December of last year through March of 2014, at the request of the official Syrian authorities to the UN and the OPCW, Russia implemented a massive flow of specialized equipment, including: 50 all-wheel-drive KAMAZ trucks, 41 all-wheel-drive Ural armored trucks with additional protection units, 30 BTR-80 armored personnel carriers, two units of induction mine detectors, five mine exploders, 52 tent units, and 13 makeshift motor-drawn kitchen units. In exchange for Russia’s contribution of two million dollars to the UN special fund for Syria, the joint UN-OPCW mission has implemented other purchases necessary for the security of the transport operation. In short, Moscow has done everything possible in order to ensure that the process of chemical weapons removal from Syria be far-reaching and systematic. Besides the supply of materials and machinery, the Russian missile cruiser Pyotr Velikiy, together with Chinese, Danish, and Norwegian military ships, has continued until recently to assure the security of the weapons removal operation’s maritime phase. Incidentally, a center for coordinating the action of this multinational naval group has been established on board the Russian cruiser, where it functions effectively.
But even this Russian cruiser, completing such an important task, has become a thorn in the side of the West, which will use any pretext or none at all to try to lower Russia’s international prestige. Thus, for example, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen declared that Russian ships will have no part in assuring the security of the American vessel Cape Ray, on which the destruction of chemical weapons removed from Syria is set to take place. “We have suspended the planning for our… NATO-Russia joint mission, the maritime escort for the U.S. ship Cape Ray, which will neutralize Syria’s chemical weapons… Russia will not be involved in the escort of the US vessel,” Fogh Rasmussen announced.
In place of a Russian cruiser, the German destroyer leader Augsburg, with 300 soldiers on board, is being sent into the Mediterranean Sea, where, together with the ships of other countries, it will protect the American vessel Cape Ray. The Bundeswehr mission will begin at the end of April and will continue until 31 December, Reuters news agency reports. A quantity of up to 560 tons of poison gas is expected to be disposed of on board the US vessel. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier welcomed his parliament’s decision and underscored that Germany’s participation in the effort will promote the implementation of important political initiatives in the area of disarmament.
It is noteworthy, however, that Germany played a significant role in the creation of the Syrian chemical arsenal. As reported by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) notified the German government of more than 50 deliveries to Syria of dual-use items, made by companies from the Federal Republic of Germany, in the period from 1982 to 1993.
In fact, this latest low-cost initiative from the West for some reason coincided with the disclosure from certain Lebanese newspapers that a successive provocation is being planned. It is reported that having established full control over the removal of chemical weapons from Syria, Western security services are attempting to transfer part of the arsenal to their minions among the Syrian terrorists. In turn, after the use of chemical weapons by the terrorists, “international specialists” will immediately materialize at the site of the tragedy and pronounce the origin of the weapons to be among the Syrian stockpiles. At which point the indefatigable US spokesman and those of US allies in the UN will place all the blame on Damascus and Russia.
Nevertheless, there are other points of view. In the words of the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Russia and the entire international community wish “for peace to reign in Syria, for the country to be sovereign and territorially integral, free from terrorism, and where the equality of all ethnic and sectarian groups is guaranteed.”
Viktor Mikhin, member-correspondent of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.
