Report for European Parliament challenges OPCW’s Syria cover-up
A new report for the European Parliament and spearheaded by veteran diplomats offers the most thorough look at the OPCW's Douma cover-up scandal to date.
A new report offers the most thorough exposé to date of the OPCW’s Syria cover-up scandal, in which the world’s top chemical watchdog manipulated an investigation to baselessly accuse Syria of a chemical weapons attack in the town of Douma.
In April 2018, after dozens of dead victims were filmed at the scene, the US, UK, and France alleged that the Syrian government had dropped gas cylinders on Douma and launched airstrikes in purported retaliation. But leaks from inside the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons show that international inspectors found no evidence of a chemical attack, raising the possibility that the incident was staged by the insurgents who controlled Douma at the time.
The OPCW team’s findings were suppressed and replaced with unsupported conclusions that aligned with the US-led narrative. When two veteran OPCW inspectors who deployed to Syria for the probe challenged the manipulation, they were silenced and later publicly defamed.
The report is authored by the Berlin Group 21, which is comprised of founding OPCW Director General Jose Bustani, former senior UN official Hans Von Sponeck, Princeton law professor Richard Falk, and academic Piers Robinson of the Organization for Propaganda Studies. Its release follows the Brazilian government's recent public shift in support of accountability over the OPCW's cover-up scandal. The report was submitted to members of the European Parliament as a contribution to discussions around the OPCW.
Aaron Maté speaks to Von Sponeck and Robinson about their new report, as well as the ongoing effort to challenge the OPCW's Douma deception and seek justice for the Douma victims.
Guests: Hans von Sponeck and Piers Robinson.
Links:
New Berlin Group 21 report on the Douma scandal
Trailer for "A Symphony for a Common Man", a new documentary about founding OPCW chief Jose Bustani, including his showdown with the Bush administration before the Iraq war and his efforts to challenge the OPCW's Syria cover-up.
Aaron Mate at UN: OPCW cover-up denies justice to Syria victims
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I think it was Aaron's reporting on this topic that opened my eyes to the moral and pragmatic bankruptcy of the U.S.-led international order.
Back then, it struck me as absurd that Assad, with a major and defining victory over ISIS in hand, would decide to cross the one U.S.-declared red line.
Since then, I've been amazed at the amount of absurd propaganda peddled by the U.S. government and mainstream media: "Putin's unprovoked war", "debunked allegations of Biden family corruption", etc. Newspeak reigns.