Syria Hit With Chemical Attack Kill More than 49 people

There have been international reactions over a chemical attack on a rebel-held town in Syria’s eastern Ghouta, linked with deaths of dozens of people.

Washington and London said the reports – if confirmed – would demand an immediate international response.

A joint statement by the medical relief organization Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS) and the civil defense service, which operates in rebel-held areas, said 49 people had died in the attack late on Saturday. Others put the toll at 150 or more.

The Russian-backed Syrian state denied government forces had launched any chemical attack as the reports began circulating and said the rebels were collapsing and fabricating news.

The lifeless bodies of around a dozen children, women and men, some of them with foam at the mouth, were shown in one video circulated by activists. “Douma city, April 7 … there is a strong smell here,” a voice can be heard saying.

The U.S. State Department said reports of mass casualties from the attack were “horrifying” and would, if confirmed, “demand an immediate response by the international community”.

Britain’s Foreign Office also called the reports, if confirmed, “very concerning” and said “an urgent investigation is needed and the international community must respond. We call on the Assad regime and its backers, Russia and Iran, to stop the violence against innocent civilians.”

Russia, however, dismissed the reports. “We decidedly refute this information,” Major-General Yuri Yevtushenko, head of the Russian peace and reconciliation center in Syria, was cited as saying by Interfax news service.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has won back control of nearly all of eastern Ghouta in a Russian-backed military campaign that began in February, leaving just Douma in rebel hands.

The Ghouta offensive has been one of the deadliest in Syria’s seven-year-long war, killing more than 1,600 civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Facing military defeat, rebel groups in other parts of eastern Ghouta have taken safe passage to other opposition-held areas at the Turkish border. Until now, Jaish al-Islam has rejected that option, demanding it be allowed to stay in Douma.

However, Syrian state television said on Sunday Jaish al-Islam had asked for negotiations with the government. A pro-Syrian opposition TV station, Orient, said talks were underway between Jaish al-Islam and Russia to reach a final settlement for Douma.

-NAN