Syria's Chemical Weapons

A US ship carrying deadly material from Syria's chemical weapons program has left Italy in the final phases of the destruction of the arsenal.

The naval vessel is taking the cargo, including mustard gas and components of the nerve agents VX and sarin, to international waters to be destroyed.

The materials were transferred from a Danish vessel to the US ship earlier on Wednesday, at the port of Gioia Tauro.

Syria agreed to the destruction of its chemical weapons stockpile last year.

The deal - backed by the UN and brokered by the US and Russia - was struck amid the threat of US air strikes, triggered by a sarin gas attack on a rebel-held suburb of Damascus.

The shipment marks the closing phases in the operation to destroy Syria's toxic arsenal.

The Danish vessel, Ark Futara, docked on Wednesday morning, carrying the materials and accompanied by Italian coast guard ships and a military helicopter.

The transfer of the cargo to the US ship was completed amid tight security, with access roads to the port sealed off.

The US vessel is equipped with a plant where the bulk of the chemicals can be neutralised by the process of hydrolysis.

During hydrolysis, the chemical agents are broken down with hot water and then further neutralized with sodium hydroxide - also known as caustic soda or lye.

Any remaining waste is expected to be buried on land, in purpose-built facilities.

Italy's Environment Minister, Gian Luca Galletti, said on Twitter that he was proud of his country's "contribution to international security", adding that the operation at Gioia Tauro was transparent and environmentally safe.

However, a trade unionist at the port told AFP he was concerned about the transfer. 

"This is not a routine operation, it's a military operation and we are very worried," Domenico Macri said.  "If there's an accident, a container breaks or falls, the substances which would come out could do serious damage," he said.

It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This

The Obama administration has concluded that Syrian President Bashar Assad's government used chemical weapons against the rebels seeking to overthrow him and, in a major policy shift, President Obama has decided to supply military support to the rebels, the White House announced Thursday.

"The president has made a decision about providing more support to the opposition that will involve providing direct support to the Supreme Military Council. That includes military support," Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communication Ben Rhodes told reporters.

President Obama has repeatedly said that the use of chemical weapons is a "red line" that, if crossed, would be a "game changer" for more U.S. involvement in the Syrian civil war. 

"The President has been clear that the use of chemical weapons - or the transfer of chemical weapons to terrorist groups - is a red line for the United States," said Rhodes in a separate written statement.

"The President has said that the use of chemical weapons would change his calculus, and it has," he continued.

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BEIRUT — A Syrian rebel group's pledge of allegiance to al-Qaeda's replacement for Osama bin Laden suggests that the terrorist group's influence is not waning and that it may take a greater role in the Western-backed fight to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad.

The pledge of allegiance by Syrian Jabhat al Nusra Front chief Abou Mohamad al-Joulani to al-Qaeda leader Sheik Ayman al-Zawahri was coupled with an announcement by the al-Qaeda affiliate in Iraq, the Islamic State of Iraq, that it would work with al Nusra as well.

Lebanese Sheik Omar Bakri, a Salafist who says states must be governed by Muslim religious law, says al-Qaeda has assisted al Nusra for some time.

"They provided them early on with technical, military and financial support , especially when it came to setting up networks of foreign jihadis who were brought into Syria," Bakri says. "There will certainly be greater coordination between the two groups."

The United States, which supports the overthrow of Assad, designated al Nusra a terrorist entity in December. The Obama administration has said it wants to support only those insurgent groups that are not terrorist organizations.

Al Nusra and groups like it have seen some of the most significant victories against Syrian government forces in the course of the 2-year-old uprising in which Assad's forces have killed about 80,000 people. Rebels not affiliated with al-Qaeda have pressed Washington for months to send weaponry that will allow them to match the heavy weapons of the Syrian army. They've urged the West to mount an air campaign against Assad's mechanized forces.

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We the people are whitcha ma man....

Possible Use of Chemicals

UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations will launch an investigation into the “possible use of chemical weapons in Syria,” Secretary General Ban Ki moon announced Thursday.

Speaking to reporters at U.N. headquarters, Ban said that his top advisers are still trying to determine the scope of the mission, the composition of the team and the steps required to guarantee the safety of U.N. personnel during their probe.

Their immediate task will be to investigate the possible use of chemical weapons in an attack Tuesday on a village near Aleppo. But Ban hinted that the team’s mandate could be broader, saying “there are other allegations of similar cases involving the reported use of chemical weapons.”

The Obama administration signaled its support for a wide-ranging probe, with U.N. Ambassador Susan E. Rice saying in a statement that officials back an investigation that “pursues any and all credible allegations of the possible use of chemical weapons in Syria.”

Although the facts have not been established, President Obama said Wednesday that he was “deeply skeptical of any claim that it was the opposition that used chemical weapons,” noting that only the regime has the capacity to carry out such an attack.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 26 people, including 16 Syrian soldiers, died in the attack. But the observatory’s director, who uses the pseudonym Rami Abdulrahman, said he could confirm only “that there was a rocket attack but not that any chemicals were used.”

Photographs posted online by the official Syrian Arab News Agency showed alleged victims in hospital beds flanked by medical staff in surgical masks. State television featured an interview with an elderly man wearing a face mask and a white bandage on his forehead. “They fired a missile, and it exploded with something like a powder,” the man said.

In the same TV report, a doctor said the patients appeared to have been exposed to “phosphorus material or some poisonous material,” which he said had led to “heavy vomiting and difficulty in breathing, almost appearing like extreme suffocation cases.”

Russia’s U.N. envoy, Vitaly I Churkin, denounced the European initiative, which is backed by the United States and many other council members, as a delaying tactic and insisted that Ban limit its immediate investigation into the single case in Aleppo. “There is just one allegation of the use of chemical weapons,” he said. “This is really a way to delay the need for immediate urgent investigation of allegations pertaining to March 19 by raising all sorts of issues.”

Churkin made it clear that the 15-nation council would not be in a position to agree on a plan for a wider probe into possible use of chemical weapons in Syria.

But Ban said that he has authority to act on his own. Ban hinted that his mandate would go beyond the specific Syrian request, saying that he hoped the mission “would contribute to ensuring the safety and security of chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria. The investigation mission is to look into the specific incident brought to my attention by the Syrian government. I am, of course, aware that there are other allegations of similar cases involving the reported use of chemical weapons.”