Non-State Actors in Mideast 'Use Chemical Weapons as Means of Warfare'

Alleged chemical weapon attacks in Syria and Iraq by such non-state actors as Daesh terrorists can we widespread, US National Intelligence Director James Clapper said in a testimony on Tuesday.

NEW YORK (Sputnik) — Earlier, a Turkish CHP party member Eren Erdem said in an interview with RT that chemical weapon materials for the production of sarin gas had been delivered to Daesh terrorist group in Syria via Turkey in 2013. According to Erdem, the Turkish authorities knew about these supplies.

Ankara failed to probe the shipment and a criminal case into the issue was unexpectedly closed earlier, despite abundant evidence which included wiretapped phone conversations between Daesh representatives and unnamed Turkish nationals.

“We assess that non-state actors in the region are also using chemicals as a means of warfare,” Clapper said.

“The OPCW [Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons] investigation into an alleged ISIL [Daesh] attack in Syria in August led it to conclude that at least two people were exposed to sulfur mustard. We continue to track numerous allegations of ISIL’s use of chemicals in attacks in Iraq and Syria, suggesting that attacks might be widespread.”

The UN Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has found out that people in Syria might have been exposed to sarin or a sarin-like gas in at least 11 incidents reported by the Syrian government, according to a UN report.

Sarin is a lethal gas, classified by the UN Resolution 687 as a weapon of mass destruction and banned by the UN Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993. By late October 2014, the OPCW declared nearly 98 percent of the chemical weapons in Syria have been removed and destroyed.