What we know about Syria’s chemical weapons

By Laura Smith-Spark and Juliet Perry

CNN

Horrifying images and video show civilians — including children — struggling to breathe, foam coming from their mouths as they appear to die of asphyxiation after an airstrike in northwestern Syria on Tuesday.

Syria’s military has denied using chemical weapons and blamed rebels for the carnage, but activists say the regime is responsible for a chemical attack which killed at least 70 people. Russia, meanwhile, has blamed the deaths on a Syrian airstrike on a “terrorist” ammunition depot.

It’s not yet confirmed what chemical agent was involved in the attack in Khan Sheikhoun, Idlib province. But early indicators point to the release of a nerve agent like sarin.

“The symptoms were pale skin, sweating, narrow or pin-eye pupils, very intense respiratory detachments. Those symptoms match the usage of sarin,” said a doctor in a hospital close to Khan Sheikhoun, who cannot be named for security reasons. He said tests were needed to identify whether sarin, a man-made nerve agent, was to blame.

The regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is supposed to have given up its chemical weapons stockpile, but not everyone is convinced.

Before the war began in 2011, Syria had research and production facilities near Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, Latakia and Hama that turned out hundreds of tons of chemical agents a year, according to the US-based James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and the Nuclear Threat Initiative, which catalogs the world’s arsenals of weapons of mass destruction.

Syria never signed the Chemical Weapons Convention, the current international treaty against the use of poison gas, but it did sign the 1925 Geneva Protocol, which banned the use of chemical and bacteriological warfare, according to the international Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW.)

Experts from the agency were part of a UN team that found “clear and convincing evidence” that sarin was delivered by surface-to-surface rockets “on a relatively large scale” in the Ghouta area of the Syrian capital Damascus in August 2013.

The attack prompted Obama to ask Congress to authorize military action against Syria. Shortly after, Syria agreed to a Russian proposal to give up control of its chemical weapons, leading Obama to retreat from threats of military action.

In October 2013, the OPCW oversaw the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapon stockpile. But one Syrian general, who said he defected after he was ordered to use chemical agents, told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour at the time that the regime would never give up its chemical stockpile.

“The locations of most of the scientific research centers in Syria and the storage facilities are known and under surveillance, thus, he will give up those centers and facilities for sure without lying. That said, however, Bashar al-Assad will not give up the chemical stockpile,” said Syrian Brig. Gen. Zaher al-Sakat in 2013.

Russia’s defense ministry said on its Facebook page that a Syrian airstrike had hit a “terrorist” ammunition depot in the eastern outskirts of Khan Sheikhoun.

The ministry said “terrorists had been transporting chemical munitions from this largest arsenal to the territory of Iraq.”

Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Fayssal Mikdad similarly told al-Mayadeen TV that Syria had given the OPCW and United Nations information in recent weeks on the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group transporting toxic substances into Syria, state-run news agency SANA reported.

But Dan Kaszeta, a chemical weapons specialist and managing director of Strongpoint Security, said the Russian version of Tuesday’s events was implausible, in a piece published on citizen journalist website Bellingcat.

All the nerve agents used in the Syrian conflict so far have been binary chemical warfare agents, he said, which are mixed from different components within a few days of use. This is done because of the difficulties of safely storing and handling agents such as sarin.

“Even assuming that large quantities of both sarin precursors were located in the same part of the same warehouse (a practice that seems odd), an air-strike is not going to cause the production of large quantities of sarin,” Kaszeta wrote. “One of the precursors is isopropyl alcohol. It would go up in a ball of flame. A very large one. Which has not been in evidence.

“Another issue is that, if the Syrian regime actually did believe that the warehouse stored chemical warfare agents, then striking it deliberately was an act of chemical warfare by proxy.”

UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson also dismissed the idea that rebel forces were responsible.

“I’ve seen absolutely nothing to lead us to think that it is anything but the regime,” he said. “All the evidence I have seen suggests that it was the Assad regime who did it in a full knowledge they were using illegal weapons in a barbaric attack on their own people.”

This won’t be known for sure until tests are carried out but medical experts report symptoms consistent with the use of nerve agents, which include sarin.

“The likelihood of exposure to a chemical attack is amplified by an apparent lack of external injuries reported in cases showing a rapid onset of similar symptoms, including acute respiratory distress as the main cause of death. Some cases appear to show additional signs consistent with exposure to organophosphorus chemicals, a category of chemicals that includes nerve agents,” the World Health Organization said in a statement.

Khaula Sawah, board member and former CEO of the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations (OUSSM), said her field team in Idlib had reported that while it cannot yet be confirmed, doctors believe — based on the symptoms of the patients– that this is some form of organophosphate nerve agent.

“The symptoms rapidly developed within minutes, including redness of eyes, foaming at the mouth, contracted pupils, severe dyspnoea (labored breathing) or shortness of breath and suffocation,” she told CNN. “The symptoms progressed so rapidly that fatality occurred within 10 minutes. If there were no supportive care or ICU, people were dying.”

The Syrian American Medical Society said in a news release that hospitals in the surrounding area had “received patients who suffered symptoms indicative of an organophosphorus compounds agent, a category of toxic gases which includes sarin.”

“According to SAMS doctors on the ground, symptoms seen in patients included constricted (or ‘pinpoint’) pupils, foaming at the mouth, and the loss of consciousness, slow heart rate, slow breathing, vomiting, muscles spasms and other neurological symptoms consistent with nerve agents. Blood and secretion samples have been collected in many hospitals.”

Sarin is a clear, colorless, tasteless and odorless liquid that was originally developed in 1938 in Germany as a pesticide. It was used in two terrorist attacks in Japan in 1994 and 1995.

It’s less toxic than nerve agent VX but it’s extremely volatile. It mixes easily with water — symptoms can be brought on by drinking or even touching a contaminated water supply. It can also contaminate food and clothing.

Its effects depend on the degree and manner of exposure, says the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC.)

In liquid form, symptoms are likely to appear a few minutes to a few hours after exposure, but the effect is almost instantaneous when it’s an odorless gas. Then, victims can experience symptoms within seconds.

Symptoms of low to moderate exposure include a watery nose, blurred vision, tightness in the chest, nausea, drowsiness and headaches.

The toxic effects of nerve agents are caused by the inhibition of an enzyme the CDC calls an “off switch” for glands and muscles. Without it, the glands and muscles continue to operate, eventually causing victims to tire to the point that they’re unable to keep breathing.

Exposure to large doses can lead to loss of consciousness, convulsions, paralysis and respiratory failure. Victims can die within 10 minutes.