Growing Use of Chemical Weapons by Terrorist Organizations Major Challenge Facing OPCW
The HAGUE, (ST)- The accusations made against Syria by some Western countries unfairly and without tangible evidence to blame the Syrian government for using toxic chemicals constitute a repeated propaganda of lies as these accusations lack credibility and aim at distorting the Syrian government’s image, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates Faysal al-Mikdad said on Monday. He added that the propaganda aimed also at putting more political pressure as to achieve the goals of these countries which are actually the enemies of the Syrian people.
Delivering Syria’s statement during the opening of the 21st session of the Conference of the States Parties (CSP) to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) which kicked off Monday in the Hague, al-Mikdad stressed Syria’s full commitment to the CWC provisions being a member of this agreement. He reiterated that Syria has fulfilled all its pledges towards the CWC, referring to the successful cooperation between the Syrian government and the Organization for the prohibition of Chemical Weapon (OPCW).
Major challenges facing OPCW
According to al-Mikdad, the OPCW is facing two major challenges: first, to force Israel to join the Chemical Weapons Convention and other treaties in order to get a Weapons of Mass Destruction-free Middle East. Second, to put an end to the danger of what is called chemical terrorism by confronting the growing use of chemical weapons by terrorist organizations like “Daesh”, “Jabhat al-Nusra” and other al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist groups.
He went on to say that “the continuity of delivering toxic chemical materials to terrorist groups to be used in Syria or in other places, is a very dangerous issue that reminds the OPCW member states of their responsibility to implement the Chemical Weapons Convention and other international agreements relating to fighting terrorism in addition to relevant Security Council Resolutions, particularly No. 1540.”
Transparency and Positivity
The deputy minister affirmed that despite the critical circumstances in the country, Syria has been keen on dealing with OPCW with complete transparency and positivity by implementing all its commitments according to the CWC. He thanked all the countries that showed satisfaction over the level of Syria’s cooperation with the OPCW work.
Syria’s cooperation hailed
OPCW Director-General Ahmet Uzumcu made a general statement at the opening of the session in which he hailed the continuous cooperation between the Syrian Arab Republic and the organization and referred to progress achieved by Syria in implementing its commitments towards the CWC.
Hamda Mustafa