PRESS RELEASE
Russia’s UN Deputy Envoy Slams Obama Policy over Syria Chemical Attack; Kremlin’s Peskov Warns of Provocation
April 6, 2017 (EIRNS)—Russia’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, Vladimir Safronkov, slammed the Obama Administration’s policy for the chemical attack provocations in Syria, placing the real blame for the hoked-up crisis where it should be.
"The former U.S. Administration’s so-called red lines, which should have triggered a military interference in the internal Syrian conflict if crossed, marked a watershed in the history of toxic chemicals in Syria and followed by full-blown poisonous substances,"
Safronkov said. "That decision became a pivot for further provocations by terrorist and extremist bodies, with the use of chemical weapons."
The West’s interest in incidents with chemical weapons "unfortunately has a well-defined ideological slant," he added.
"We can say that it is inextricably interwoven with the fabric of anti-Damascus campaign that is still dragging its feet towards the dustbin of history it deserves."
"At the time, our Western partners preferred to keep silent, including over the request from Damascus submitted in March 2013 to investigate the use by militants of the sarin nerve agent in an attack on Aleppo’s outskirts,"
Safronkov said. "We are hopeful it will not be repeated this time."
Russian Presidential spokesman Dimitry Peskov in a statement on April 6 said that accusations against the Syrian government are being made with insufficient and unreliable evidence, and he warned of possible provocation.
"No doubt, forces exist that are pushing for de-legitimization of the lawful leadership of the Syrian Arab Republic. And there exist the forces of terrorism and those who support terrorists,"
Peskov replied to a question about who, in his opinion, stood to gain from exploiting the situation. "This was a dangerous and monstrous crime, but it would be incorrect to hang labels [to identify those who did it]," Peskov told reporters on a conference call.
Peskov said evidence about the incident provided by the White Helmets civil defense group could not be considered reliable, saying: "We do not agree with these conclusions."
"Immediately after the tragedy no one had access to this region.... Any data which the U.S. side or our colleagues from other countries might have had access to could not have been based on objective facts,"
Peskov told reporters.
"The main idea is to refrain from hasty conclusions," Peskov told journalists.
"We need information exchange, to verify the facts and to draw conclusions only after that, but not before. Any conclusion drawn before such exchange of information would be certainly viewed as a conclusion which does not reflect the reality."
Peskov also said that the disagreement was unlikely to change the nature of ties between Russia and the United States.
