{"id":214873,"date":"2020-10-12T07:25:57","date_gmt":"2020-10-12T07:25:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=214873"},"modified":"2020-10-15T06:17:38","modified_gmt":"2020-10-15T06:17:38","slug":"us-uk-and-france-block-ex-opcw-chiefs-testimony-at-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=214873","title":{"rendered":"US, UK, and France Block Ex-OPCW Chief\u2019s Testimony at UN"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dave DeCamp \u2013 AntiWar.com Oct 6, 2020<\/strong><\/h1>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Hassan Diab shown in Al-Jazeera\u2019s coverage of the alleged chemical attack. Click to see the full-size image<\/p><\/div>\n

On Monday, at the UN Security Council, the US, the UK, France, and allies blocked testimony from a former director-general of<\/strong><\/span><\/a> the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). Jose Bustani is a Brazilian diplomat and was the first director-general of the OPCW, which was formed in 1997.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bustani was pushed out of the organization in 2002<\/strong><\/span><\/a> by the Bush administration for his efforts to negotiate with Saddam Hussein. The Brazilian was prepared to deliver testimony to the UN Security Council on Monday over the OPCW\u2019s investigation into an alleged chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria, in April 2018.<\/span><\/p>\n

The US, UK, and France responded to the alleged Douma attack with airstrikes on Syrian government targets. After the strike, OPCW inspectors arrived in Douma to investigate.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since the OPCW released its final report on the alleged Douma attack in March 2019, a trove of leaked documents have surfaced<\/strong><\/span><\/a>. The leaks, along with whistleblower testimony, suggest\u00a0the OPCW suppressed evidence and ignored the findings of senior inspectors<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u00a0to fit the narrative that the Syrian government carried out a chemical attack in Douma.<\/span><\/p>\n

In October 2019, Bustani attended a panel hosted by the Courage Foundation<\/strong><\/span><\/a> that heard testimony from an OPCW whistleblower who presented evidence that the Douma investigation was corrupted. After hearing the evidence, the panel released a statement<\/a><\/strong><\/span> urging the OPCW to revisit its investigation into the Douma incident.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Grayzone<\/em> published Bustani\u2019s prepared statement<\/strong><\/span><\/a> that he was blocked from delivering at the UN Security Council. In his statement, Bustani urges Fernando Arias, the current OPCW director-general, to hear out the inspectors who were on the ground in Douma and had their findings suppressed:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI would like to make a personal plea to you, Mr Fernando Arias, as Director General of the OPCW. The inspectors are among the Organization\u2019s most valuable assets. As scientists and\u00a0engineers, their specialist knowledge and inputs are essential for good decision making. Most importantly, their views are untainted by politics or national interests. They only rely on the science. The inspectors in the Douma investigation have a simple request \u2013 that they be given the opportunity to meet with you to express their concerns to you in person, in a manner that is both transparent and accountable.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The OPCW inspector was due to testify on his findings on the alleged \u201cchemical weapons\u201d attack on, which was used by the West to justify air strikes on Syria<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-214873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-syria"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=214873"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214873\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214875,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214873\/revisions\/214875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=214873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=214873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=214873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}