OIC Secretary General underlines the need to hold accountable those who are responsible for use of Chemical Weapons in Syria

Following the release of the report of the UN inspection team on the use of chemical weapons against civilians in Syria and while welcoming the agreement between the USA and the Russian Federation on the chemical weapons in Syria, the Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, has commended the professionalism with which the inspectors carried out their mission although the report did not clearly identify the perpetrators. He expressed the hope that the UN Security Council would urgently follow-up the content of this important report. The Secretary General reiterated the principled position of the OIC condemning the use of chemical weapons as forbidden by the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). He strongly stressed the imperative to hold to account any party involved in the production, transfer, development, and use of chemical weapons in Syria. The use of such weapons in Syria on 21 August 2013 must be considered as a war crime and a crime against humanity. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu further emphasized the urgency of making the Middle East region a free from all kinds of weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons.