UN chemical weapons experts will
visit the site of an alleged poison gas attack in Syria to conduct
investigations beginning on Monday, the United Nations said. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's office said
in a statement on Sunday that Syria had promised to observe a ceasefire at the
site in the suburbs of Damascus while a UN team begins "on-site
fact-finding activities".
The UN experts arrived in Damascus three
days before a mass poisoning killed many hundreds of people on Wednesday in
what appears to have been the world's worst chemical weapons attack in 25
years.
Syria said earlier on Sunday it had agreed to let the experts visit the
site.
In turn, a senior official in the
US administration said on Sunday that the United States now has little doubt
the Syrian government used chemical weapons against civilians last week, and
President Barack Obama is studying how to respond.
"Based on the reported number of
victims, reported symptoms of those who were killed or injured, witness
accounts, and other facts gathered by open sources, the US intelligence
community, and international partners, there is very little doubt at this point
that a chemical weapon was used by the Syrian regime against civilians in this
incident," the official told Reuters.
"We are continuing to assess the facts
so the president can make an informed decision about how to respond to this
indiscriminate use of chemical weapons," the official added.
For his part, senior US Democratic senator,
Jack Reed said that any US response to the alleged use of chemical weapons in
Syria must be part of an international action.
"This has to be an international
operation, it can't be a unilateral American approach," Reed said on CBS
television's Face the Nation show. "It has to have support
internationally, not just politically, but militarily," he said, adding
that Washington could not get into a "general military operation in Syria."
Meanwhile, Russia said that
assigning blame too soon over the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria
would be a "tragic mistake", ahead of a United Nations' investigation
on Monday.
"We strongly urge those who by trying
to impose their opinion on UN experts ahead of the results of an investigation
... to exercise discretion and not make tragic mistakes," the Russian
Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Pentagon prepared to carry out military options on Syria
US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said that the Pentagon is prepared to carry out military options on Syria should President Barack Obama order them.
Hagel echoed White House statements cautioning that America was still gathering the facts about the Syrian government's alleged use of poison gas against civilians.
But he noted that the US military, which is repositioning its naval forces in the Mediterranean to give Obama the option for an armed strike, was ready to act if asked.
"President Obama has asked the Defense Department to prepare options for all contingencies. We have done that and we are prepared to exercise whatever option - if he decides to employ one of those options," Hagel told reporters at a news conference in Kuala Lumpur.
American and European security sources have said US and allied intelligence agencies made a preliminary assessment that chemical weapons were used by Syrian forces in the attack. The United Nations has requested access to the site.
Hagel, whose week-long trip to Asia is being overshadowed by Syria tensions, participated remotely in a meeting on Saturday that Obama held with his top military and national security advisers to hash out options on Syria.
Asked whether, after that meeting, he was personally convinced chemical weapons had been used in Syria, Hagel said: "We, along with our allies, are continuing to assess the intelligence, and the specifics of that intelligence, on the use chemical weapons."
Obama has been reluctant to intervene in Syria's civil war, but reports of the killings near Damascus have put pressure on the White House to make good on the president's comment a year ago that chemical weapons would be a "red line" for the United States.
Hagel did not enter into detail about what options the United States was weighing, but noted that any scenario carried risks. He noted on his flight to Malaysia that if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces intentionally used chemical weapons, "there may be another attack coming".
On the field:
Syrian state television said on
Sunday a car bomb has killed the governor of the central province of Hama.
State TV says Anas Abdul Razaak
Naem was assassinated Sunday in the Jarajima neighborhood of the city of Hama,
the provincial capital. No further details were immediately available.
This as the head of the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front had pledged to target communities from Syria's Alawite faith, followed by President Bashar al-Assad, with rockets in revenge for an alleged chemical attack on the outskirts of Damascus, according to an audio recording seen on Sunday.
"For every chemical rocket that had fallen on our people in Damascus, one of their villages will, by the will of God, pay for it," Abu Mohammad al-Golani said in the recording posted on YouTube.
"On top of that we will prepare a thousand rockets that will be fired on their towns in revenge for the Damascus Ghouta massacre."
Separately, four
hundred tonnes of arms have been sent into Syria from Turkey to boost
insurgent capabilities against Syrian government forces, opposition
sources said, after a suspected chemical weapons strike on rebellious
suburbs of Damascus.
The source said the Gulf-financed shipment, which crossed from the
Turkish province of Hatay in the past 24 hours, was one of the single
biggest to reach rebel brigades since the uprising against President
Bashar al-Assad turned violent two years ago.
A senior officer in the Gulf and Western backed Supreme Military
Council, an umbrella group for rebel units, confirmed the shipment, and
said that weapons airlifts into Turkey have increased since rebel held
Sunni Muslim neighborhood and suburbs of Damascus were gassed last week.
REUTERS/AP
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