The Euro Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN) calls on the Syrian government to allow UN experts to get access to the Damascus outskirts in the Ghouta region in the wake of the alleged chemical attack yesterday, and to open humanitarian ‘corridors’ as a matter of urgency to ensure adequate medical assistance is provided to the civilian population.
‘This attack occurred while the UN investigation team on the use of chemical weapons lead by Sellstrom was in Damascus. We thus call on the Syrian government to guarantee the mission access to the Ghouta area without delay. The UN Mission should be able to collect all the evidence available on the ground right away so as to shed light on the exact circumstances leading to this dramatic event or otherwise withdraw from Syria’, declared EMHRN President Michel Tubiana.
The EMHRN gathered information from Syrian activists on the ground reporting that rockets loaded with toxic agents hit the opposition-controlled district East of Damascus (called Ghouta area) in the early hours of Wednesday morning, August 21st. The attack coincided with tank and air strikes shelling which notably prevented inhabitants to seek refuge on heights and rooftops in order to escape from the gas effects. Hundreds of civilians were killed during the attack, including many women and children, either from gas effects or due to the shelling of the area.
‘Indiscriminately targeting civilians by use of weapons of mass destruction is not only utterly intolerable but amounts to a crime against humanity. Those behind these acts must be referred to the International Criminal Court’, added President Tubiana.
The EMHRN received further evidence indicating that the Syrian government is preventing the access of any humanitarian help to the civilian population. Doctors and civilians attempting to access the area were reportedly arrested at check points. A few days before the attack, militants in the area had sent an emergency appeal as to the severely deteriorating humanitarian crisis in the Ghouta district, a region besieged by the Syrian security forces for more than a year now. The EMHRN is extremely worried about the situation of the civilian population which remains cut from basic necessities and about first aid not reaching victims of the attack.
‘We urge the Syrian authorities to immediately allow aid workers to provide field hospitals in Ghouta with adequate medical provision. Humanitarian corridors must be opened immediately to that end,’ stressed EMHRN President.