The Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in Syria (FFM) issued a temporary report on the incident in the city of Douma in Damascus countryside on April 7, 2018.
The (FFM) published its report on 6 July 2018 numbered (S/1645/2018), providing updates on its work regarding the assumed use of toxic chemicals as a weapon in the city of Douma in rural Damascus on 7 April 2018.
There were two attacks on the same day in Douma, one was at 4 p.m. local time and the second was around 7.30 p.m., with unconfirmed news of approximately 40 and 70 deaths, including children, and hundreds injured, and suspected of using either chlorine or sarin gas or a substance in between as a chemical weapon on civilians.
The report confirmed that, the Technical Secretariat of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and representatives of the Syrian regime on 10 April 2018 exchanged verbal notes regarding the urgent letter of the (FFM) team to collect facts about the assumed incident in Douma and the use of chemicals as a weapon, which was already sent on 12 April 2018.
The team arrived in Damascus on 15 April, taking into consideration that the team was not able to enter Douma until about a week after their arrival, due to security risks, such as the high potential presence of unexploded weaponry.
During an exploratory visit into two important sites in Douma, on April 18, 2018, the team was exposed to gunfire and a hand grenade explosion, killing two people and injuring one more person. on the 21st of April 2018 the team was successfully able to enter the area for the first time, and visited within 10 days, several places, including a warehouse and a facility suspected by the Syrian regime of producing chemical weapons. However, based on the information gathered by the mission team during the two field visits, there was no indication that the two locations were involved in producing chemical agents or toxic substances for use as weapons.
The team’s activities included field visits to collect environmental samples, interview witnesses, collect data, and review documents and information which were provided by the regime government, in the presence of official representatives from the Syrian regime government.
In addition, the team found two compressed gas industrial cylinders near the specific sites that the team visited separately.
The team interviewed also 34 people, 13 of whom were interviewed in Damascus, and the rest were in a not specified neighboring country.
The mission’s report explained in detail the objectives and domain of the fact-finding mission, the timetable allocated to the team, answering the question of how to get to the site of the assumed incident and the methodological considerations, while the report did not contain any inevitable results yet.
chemical_attack chemical_weapons douma FFM ghouta syria
