By: IBRAHIM Jaafar
April 7 marks the second year of the Douma chemical attack. On the morning of April 7, 2018, the Assad regime deliberately used chlorine gas to target civilians in Douma, a town in the suburbs of Syria’s capital, Damascus. Victims rapidly experienced vision loss, nausea, and ultimately respiratory failure.
The Assad regime’s chemical attack against innocent civilians killed at least 44 people. The regime, backed by its Iranian and Russian allies, denied all involvement. Russian state-backed media have led a campaign to discredit witnesses and victims. The regime and Russia have sought to obstruct the investigation of the OPCW Fact-Finding Mission in Syria on numerous occasions, including denying OPCW investigators access to the site until April 21, 2018. This investigation ultimately confirmed the use of chemical weapons at Douma and discredited the regime’s claims that the attack had been staged by the Syrian opposition.
The World Health Organization said on 11 April that it had received reports from its local "health cluster partners" of 43 deaths related to symptoms consistent with exposure to highly toxic chemicals".
The Syria Civil Defence and SAMS said rescue workers found 42 people dead in their homes. One person was declared dead on arrival at a hospital, and another six died while receiving treatment, they added. An earlier, now deleted tweet by the Syria Civil Defence put the number dead at more than 150.
President Assad has accused the US, UK and France of "staging" the incident in Douma with the help of the Syria Civil Defence, which receives funding from Western governments.
"It was a lie. After we liberated that area our information confirmed the attack did not take place," he (Assad) told the Daily Mail on 9 June. "The British government should prove with evidence that the attack happened, and then they should prove who is responsible. This did not happen." Report from The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) struck a blow to Assad claim to prove that the government actually launched the attack.
In August 2013, rockets containing Sarin were fired at several opposition-held suburbs in the Eastern and Western Ghouta, killing hundreds of people. UN experts confirmed that Sarin was used in the attack, but they were not asked to ascribe any blame.
Western powers said only Syrian government forces could have carried out the attack. President Assad denied the allegation, but he did agree to sign the Chemical Weapons Convention and destroy Syria's declared chemical arsenal.
Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on protesters with unexpected ferocity. Since then, hundreds of thousands of people are believed to have been killed and millions more displaced by the conflict.
Countless massacres have unfolded in Syria at the hands of the Assad regime and its backers. Hence, there is need to bring an end to the killing in Syria and to hold war criminals accountable so that one day Syrians might live in a country of peace and justice.”