U.N SYRIA REPORT RELEASED

U.N. Syria report released U.N. weapons inspectors returned "overwhelming and indisputable" evidence of the use of nerve gas in Syria, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Monday, calling the findings "beyond doubt and beyond the pale." The inspectors' 38-page report was released after Ban briefed Security Council members on its contents. The team found what it called "clear and convincing evidence" that the nerve agent sarin was delivered by surface-to-surface rockets "on a relatively large scale" in the suburbs of the Syrian capital Damascus on August 21. "It is the most significant confirmed use of chemical weapons against civilians since Saddam Hussein used them in Halabja in 1988, and the worst use of weapons of mass destruction in the 21st century," Ban said. "The international community has a responsibility to ensure that chemical weapons never re-emerge as an instrument of warfare," he said. Ban called the attack "a war crime" and a violation of treaties banning the use of chemical weapons that date back to 1925. But the inspectors' mandate did not include assigning blame for the attack, and Ban would not speculate on who launched the attack. The team did identify two types or rockets it said were used to deliver the gas and their trajectories, and international observers have said those weapons are not known to be in the hands of rebels battling the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Australian U.N. Ambassador Gary Quinlan, who is currently serving as president of the Security Council, said the report bolsters his country's stance. It "confirms, in our view, that there is no remaining doubt that it was the regime that used chemical weapons." Read the report And Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador, said a preliminary review of the report points toward forces loyal to al-Assad. "The regime possesses sarin, and we have no evidence that the opposition possesses sarin," Power said. "It defies logic" to think members of the opposition would have infiltrated a regime-controlled area to fire on opposition-controlled areas. Britain, France, and NATO have also said al-Assad's regime was behind the attack. But Russia is Syria's leading ally, and Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin maintained Moscow's stance that Syrian rebels might be to blame.