Claimants of Syria chemical attacks Saddam accomplices: FM

“Those who, plotting a dangerous and occult scenario, claim that chemical weapons have been used in Syria, are the ones who ignored the use of weapons of mass destruction and banned chemical armaments against Iranian soldiers and civilians,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a message published on Saturday on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Saddam regime’s chemical attack against the innocent people of Sardasht in West Azarbaijan Province.

“They are the same people who were also involved in arming and providing full support for the criminal Saddam regime and accomplices with his crimes,” Zarif said, commemorating the victims of the anti-human felony in the Iranian city, and saluting pure souls of those killed in the chemical attack by the Ba’thists.

“It was a sad and traumatic event that once again proved the innocence of the great Iranian people during eight years of the sacred defense and recorded a major act in proof of the falsehood claimants of the human rights in the history,” Zarif said.

“The great Iranian people resisted an unfair imposed war by Saddam’s regime with direct financial, economic, military, and logistic support of some countries in the region as well as trans-regional powers,” the top diplomat said.

The Iranian people have experienced violations of human rights and basic principles of war, including the use of weapons of mass destruction against their military forces, missile strikes to cities and intentional destruction of cities such as Khoramshahr by the defeated forces of Saddam, Zarif added.

The Iranian people had to bear with the silence of the human rights claimants and their support for Saddam and his regime, he said.

Hundreds of women, men, and children were martyred in the city of Sardasht and once again there was no offering regret or denouncing or decisive measures by the world powers to stop all these, he said.

Zarif also emphasized that “contrary to the hypocritical and double standard policies adopted by some countries like the United States claiming to throw their weight behind human rights, the Islamic Republic of Iran in the framework of its principled policy, strongly denounces any usage or threatening to use of the weapons of mass destruction, including chemical weapons or resorting to using such weapons as a pretext to pave the way for illegal measures against nations and independent governments and it also opposes the use of these weapons anywhere and anytime by anyone.”

“The Islamic Republic of Iran Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with tribute to the victims of chemical attack to Sardasht and the survivors of the sad incident and commemorating the national day of fight against chemical and biological weapons, stresses its determination to fight against such weapons and their deployment and calls on the international community and public opinions, to use all in their capacity to stand against production, proliferation, and the use of these weapons and react against the use or threatening to use of such weapons by terrorist groups, including Daesh (ISIS) and their regional and trans-regional supporters,” Zarif said.

Iraqi Ba’ath regime on June 28, 1987, dropped mustard gas bombs on Sardasht, West Azerbaijan, in two separate bombing runs on four residential areas. The number of victims martyred in this unfair attack was 119 civilians while more than 8,000 civilians suffered injuries from the chemical gas.

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