Trump to address the nation on Syria tonight (UPDATE: Launching strikes)

TarNaru33 said:

Democracy overlaps with secularism and peace? Would be the first I heard of that. The improving of human rights (relative to how it was) do not = peace or secularism lol. I guess maybe the masses thought that this would be the case? Something like that takes decades though.. Would have to look at how we did Japan and Germany.



I get that, but its semantics at this point... I mean that is what I would have said after the person responding trying to correct me about it lol.

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Kukulcan said:

I seriously don't understand the fixation on chemical weapons.

Dictators or ethnic groups have commited cruelties using their hands, conventional weapons or uncounted torture instruments. Many of those crimes don't get nearly as much attention as chemical attacks.

I understand how bad Red eyes, Hypoxia and Rhinhorrhoea as I was once exposed to tear gas in a tram, but conventional bombs probably would have caused more deaths, more severed limbs or unbearable pain of burnt flesh. I find it extremely hyporcritical to let war horror happen around the world but to draw a line only because of a certain weapon type.

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Consider three policy alternatives:
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3) Countries categorically ban chemical weapons but do not categorically ban conventional weapons. This is roughly the current international regime, and strikes me as an appropriate compromise (though some conventional weapons are indeed also banned, such as land mines, and more almost certainly should be). It allows countries to pursue just wars while providing some limitation on the suffering and collateral damage induced in those wars. What's more, it disincentives even those fighting unjust wars – if the use of chemical weapons are more likely to prompt an international intervention in an otherwise internal or regional conflict, various actors have some reason to avoid their use. Admittedly, this does not seem to have dissuaded Assad, but other regimes (including the US) do appear to have become more reluctant to use chemical weapons because of the ban.

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THE HAGUE, Netherlands —6 July 2018—The Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), issued an interim report on the FFM's investigation to date regarding the allegations of chemical weapons use in Douma, Syria on 7 April 2018.

The FFM's activities in Douma included on-site visits to collect environmental samples, interviews with witnesses, data collection. In a neighbouring country, the FFM team gathered or received biological and environmental samples, and conducted witness interviews.

OPCW designated labs conducted analysis of prioritised samples. The results show that no organophosphorous nerve agents or their degradation products were detected in the environmental samples or in the plasma samples taken from alleged casualties. Along with explosive residues, various chlorinated organic chemicals were found in samples from two sites, for which there is full chain of custody. Work by the team to establish the significance of these results is on-going. The FFM team will continue its work to draw final conclusions.

The Fact-Finding Mission also issued a report on 2 July 2018 addressing allegations of chemical weapons use in Al-Hamadaniya, Syria on 30 October 2016, and Karm al-Tarrab, Syria on 13 November 2016. On the basis of the information received and analysed, the prevailing narrative of the interviews, and the results of the laboratory analyses, the FFM cannot confidently determine whether or not a specific chemical was used as a weapon in the incidents that took place in the neighbourhood of Al-Hamadaniyah and in the area of Karm al-Tarrab. The FFM noted that the persons affected in the reported incidents may, in some instances, have been exposed to some type of non-persistent, irritating substance.

The FFM's reports on the allegations of chemical weapons use in Douma, Al-Hamadaniya, and Karm Al-Tarrab have been shared with States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention. The reports were also transmitted to the UN Security Council through the UN Secretary-General.

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kruis said:

New news deserves its own thread you mean?

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kruis said:

How come I find out about this report only today?

https://www.opcw.org/news/article/o...-in-al-hamadaniya-and-karm-al-tarrab-in-2016/

OPCW Issues Fact-Finding Mission Reports on Chemical Weapons Use Allegations in Douma, Syria in 2018 and in Al-Hamadaniya and Karm Al-Tarrab in 2016



So in four cases an internation fact-finding mission found no evidence that Assad gassed his own population. The international retaliatory missile attack on various Syrian targets was based on a lie. Russia was absolutely right that the Douma gas attack was staged like they said right from the start.

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spineduke said:

Bellingcat has documented multiple instances of Bashar gassing his own people

The guy is a murderer, and you can spin it as much as you like.

Unbelievable, necrobumping a thread to toot how "clean" the regime and Russia is in all of this? Could you be any more transparent?

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The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention, which entered into force on 29 April 1997. The OPCW, with its 193 member states, has its seat in The Hague, Netherlands, and oversees the global endeavour for the permanent and verifiable elimination of chemical weapons.

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