BEIRUT, Sept 3 (Reuters) – Syria has begun destroying the remnants of a clandestine Assad-era chemical weapons program that it recovered in May, the first such destruction in a decade, a Syrian envoy and a U.N. representative said on Thursday.
Reuters reported in May that Syria’s new leadership had located remnants of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s chemical weapons program, including raw materials and munitions similar to those used in deadly gas attacks during the country’s civil war.
Izumi Nakamitsu, the United Nations High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, told a Security Council briefing on Thursday that for the first time since 2014, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons had verified the destruction of chemical munitions in Syria.
Following the May finding, Syria had found “one additional chemical weapons production facility, a newly discovered chemical used in the production of nerve agents, and empty chemical munitions. It also declared two chemical weapons storage facilities where the newly discovered facilities were being stored,” Nakamitsu said.
Last month, the OPCW deployed a team to Syria to verify the destruction of category three chemical weapons, referring to unfilled munitions and other equipment used to release chemical weapons. She said the team verified “the irreversible destruction of 42 aerial bombs” as part of that mission.
Syria’s ambassador to the U.N., Ibrahim Olabi, told the council that Syria was “protecting the world and the region through such work”.
But he heavily criticised Israel, saying that repeated Israeli attacks had impeded some search and destruction operations, and exposed the Syrian teams at work to risk.
“We cannot safeguard the security of the region if our security is exposed to attacks at the hands of Israel, and they are flouting the security of the region at large and they are breaching the conventions and treaties we have talked about,” said Olabi, whose Arabic remarks were translated at the council.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Olabi said Syria was preparing to hold the first court hearing of people suspected of involvement in the chemical weapons programme.
Syrian authorities earlier this year took 18 suspects into custody for alleged involvement in Assad’s chemical weapons program, including high-level military, political and technical officials.
(Reporting by Maya Gebeily;Editing by Alison Williams)
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