Western Propaganda Misleading

Russia’s envoy to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, has refuted US accusations that Moscow is blocking UN access to Syria “to investigate any and all credible allegations,” claiming the charge is “misleading.”

Speaking from the UN headquarters in New York, Churkin urgedm according to RT, Westerns to refrain from a “propaganda storm”, citing Russia’s tireless efforts as to facilitate a Syrian government request that the UN investigate the deployment of chemical weapons in a government-controlled suburb of Aleppo on March 19.

The ambassador also stressed Russia’s role in helping arrange an invitation for members of the UN chemical arms team to visit Damascus. The head of the UN investigation team to probe the alleged use of Chemical Weapons in Syria, Ake Sellstromand, and UN disarmament chief Angela Kane accepted an invitation from the Syrian government to discuss the investigation of alleged chemical attacks in Syria.

Ambassador Churkin refuted the US State Department’s claim that Russia was blocking a UN Security Council effort to allow UN access into Syria. “It’s not for the Security Council to allow access. It’s for the Syrian government to agree on that, with the United Nations Secretariat,” stressing the need to only look into “credible allegations,” as Western states had been attempting to create “the maximum number of allegations with minimal credibility in an effort, one might think, to create maximum problems for arranging such investigations.”

Mr. Churkin noted what he deemed to be a somewhat inadequate response by several Western countries following an announcement that Russia handed over its thorough investigation of the Aleppo incident to the UN: “Even before having a chance to look at this very serious and substantive 80-page investigation analysis,” some senior Western diplomats made “remarks…repeating this naïve story they came up from the outset…that it was the government itself who was shooting but missed the target and killed its own people.”

Ambassador Churkin underscored that the Russian inquiry makes it “absolutely clear that both the projectile and the chemical [used in March 19 Aleppo incident] were produced in a way, which rules out…production by the Syrian government” and “conclusively shows” that the chemical weapons were “in fact…used by the opposition.”

Earlier, Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, underlined that the Russian inquiry into the use of chemical weapons on Syrian territory was carried out in full accordance with international standards, unlike a similar evaluation by Western countries. 

Minister Lavrov underlined that the samples of the chemical weapons had been taken at the very place where they were used and were delivered by Russian experts rather than passed through third-party hands, pointing out that the evidence of the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government – which was provided by the US, Britain and France – does not provide information on where and when the samples they used for analysis were taken. 

Dr. Mohammad Abdo Al-Ibrahim