Syria’s Continuing Chemical Fallout
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FEB 1, 2016
THE
HAGUE – The international community’s failure to bring the Syrian civil
war to an end is a tragedy – especially for the country’s
long-suffering people. In one respect, multilateral action has had a
clearly positive impact: the elimination of the Syrian government’s
chemical-weapons program. And yet there are persistent reports that
chemical weapons, including sulfur mustard (commonly known as mustard gas) and chlorine bombs deployed against civilians, continue to be used in Syria.
The stakes could not
be higher. The perpetrators of these attacks must be identified and
brought to justice. Allowing the use of chemical weapons to go
unpunished not only could reverse one of the few promising developments
in the Syrian conflict; it also threatens to undermine international
norms on the use of toxic gas and nerve agents, increasing the
possibility that they will be used in terrorist attacks.
In August 2013, rockets containing deadly sarin gas struck Ghouta,
a rebel-controlled suburb near Damascus. Horrific images of women and
children dying in agony mobilized international consensus against the
use of these types of weapons. In October 2013, following Syria’s
accession to the Chemical Weapons Convention, a joint mission of the
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and the
United Nations was tasked with eliminating the country’s chemical
arsenal and production facilities.
Less than a year
later, the mission accomplished what no military intervention could have
achieved; the strategic threat from Syria’s chemical weapons was
effectively eliminated. Work to clarify certain aspects of the
government’s initial declaration about its weapons program is ongoing;
but 1,300 metric tons of chemical weapons, including sulfur mustard and
precursors for deadly nerve agents, have been accounted for and
destroyed under the watchful eyes of OPCW inspectors.
This achievement must
not be allowed to be rolled back. The Chemical Weapons Convention is
one of mankind’s most successful disarmament efforts. Since 1997, 192
countries have agreed to be bound by its provisions, and 91% of the
world’s declared chemical weapons have been destroyed. The continued use
of chemical weapons in the Syrian conflict is not only causing terrible
suffering among the country’s civilian population; it also risks
eroding the convention’s credibility.
A fact-finding mission established by the OPCW in April 2014 found “compelling confirmation” that a toxic chemical
– most likely chlorine gas – was used “systematically and repeatedly”
as a weapon in villages in northern Syria. It was on the basis of these
findings that the UN Security Council agreed in August 2015 to create a joint investigative mechanism of the OPCW and the UN and task it with identifying those responsible for the use of chemical weapons in the conflict.
The fog of war cannot
be allowed to create a fog of responsibility.
The perpetrators of
chemical attacks must be held to account, whoever they are.
International investigators deployed in Syria bring vital expertise to
this important mission. It is crucial that political leaders express
confidence in their impartiality, allow them to carry out their work
unobstructed, and not second-guess their conclusions.
Once those
responsible for the use of chemical weapons have been identified, the
international community must ensure that they are prosecuted, in order
to send a clear signal about the inviolability of the global ban.
Persistent
allegations that non-state actors are using chemical weapons in Syria
and northern Iraq are of particular concern, as they raise the
possibility of toxic chemicals being used in terrorist attacks.
Manufacturing nerve agents is a complex process, but extremists can
easily deploy toxic industrial chemicals – such as chlorine gas – if
they have them in their possession. A conventional attack against a
chemical facility is another potentially devastating risk – one that is
not beyond the capabilities of a well-funded terrorist group.
Nearly two decades
after the Chemical Weapons Convention entered into force, the treaty is
facing a major test. The threat that toxic gas or nerve agents will be
deployed in a conflict between countries has been all but eliminated.
Failure to punish their use in the Syrian civil war risks undermining
the regime that has brought us to the threshold of a chemical
weapons-free world.
Ahmet Üzümcü is Director-General at the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
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