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he Central Intelligence Agency, working with American troops during the occupation of Iraq, repeatedly purchased nerve-agent rockets from a secretive Iraqi seller, part of a previously undisclosed effort to ensure that old chemical weapons remaining in Iraq did not fall into the hands of terrorists or militant groups, according to current and former American officials. The extraordinary arms purchase plan, known as Operation Avarice, began in 2005 and continued into 2006, and the American military deemed it a nonproliferation success. It led to the United States’ acquiring and destroying at least 400 Borak rockets...

The international chemical weapons watchdog says that all the precursor chemicals for sarin gas removed from Syria have been destroyed. The 580 tonnes of chemicals were neutralised on board a specially built American ship in the Mediterranean Sea. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said the ship's crew have now begun to neutralise 22 tonnes of sulphur mustard. The process is part of a Russian-US deal to eliminate Syria's arsenal. The deal was drawn up after hundreds of people died in a sarin attack in the Ghouta area outside Damascus on 21 August last year... ...OPCW chief...

Iran is producing chemical weapons, including sarin gas, out of a facility in Fars Province. Sarin gas, banned under international protocol, is the gas Syria’s Assad regime used to kill more than 1,400 civilians on Aug. 21. A Revolutionary Guards base, Shahid Dastgheyb, is producing five deadly gases, under the project name of “Baasat,” as part of the Islamic regime’s chemical weapons program, according to intelligence received from a member of the Guards serving in the province. The source is not named due to security reasons. The chemical plant is outside the central city of Shiraz and close to the...

Gerhard Schindler, told German lawmakeers last week, that they had intercepted many messages to the presidential palace in Damascus, asking for permission to use sarin gas, all of which Assad refused. This is a direct contradiction of the White House talking memos that claimed we had proof positive that Assad was behind the attacks. Gerhard Schindler is the head of the German Foreign Intelligence agency. Schindler, expressly told lawmakers that Assad did not order, nor did he approve of using sarin gas.

When you add two even numbers and your answer is an odd number, you have to suspect you are wrong. When you conclude the Syrian government launched the sarin gas attack, you get an odd number, you have to wonder why the answer is also odd. Carla Del Ponte., speaking of the first gas attack, told the UN that her investigation revealed concrete suspicions that the rebels had actually launched the attack. “ "Our investigators have been in neighboring countries interviewing victims, doctors and field hospitals and, according to their report of last week which I have seen, there are...

Recent news of a chemical weapons attack in Syria smacks of desperation. The question comes down to who is most desperate right now, the Assad regime or the Muslim Brotherhood rebels? Consider that since June, Assad’s forces have been winning. According to a CBS News report from last month, victories for the rebels had become “increasingly rare” and that the Muslim Brotherhood-backed opposition fighters were sustaining “some of their heaviest losses” near Damascus. The New York Times echoed this sentiment, even saying that before gaining the upper hand, concerns were that Assad would use chemical weapons; he did not. In...

While stressing that Washington’s primary goal remained “limited and proportional” attacks, to degrade Syria’s chemical weapons capabilities and deter their future use, the president hinted at a broader long-term mission that may ultimately bring about a change of regime. “It also fits into a broader strategy that can bring about over time the kind of strengthening of the opposition and the diplomatic, economic and political pressure required – so that ultimately we have a transition that can bring peace and stability, not only to Syria but to the region,” he told senior members of Congress at a White House meeting...

Back in June, Syrian jihadists caught redhanded with Sarin gas And yes it was sarin gas used in chemical attack in Syria. Russia asks Turkey for info on sarin terrorists Turkish Weekly,  6 June 2013, (thanks to Bev Perlson) Russia has called on Turkey to share its findings in the case of Syrian rebels who were seized on the Turkish-Syrian border with a 2kg cylinder full of nerve gas sarin. Russia’s top foreign official Sergei Lavrov tolday said the Kremlin wanted to get clear on the issue of chemical weapons used in Syria, since the allegation had taken on...

When you add two even numbers and your answer is an odd number, you have to suspect you are wrong. When you conclude the Syrian government launched the sarin gas attack, you get an odd number, you have to wonder why the answer is also odd. Carla Del Ponte., speaking of the first gas attack, told the UN that her investigation revealed concrete suspicions that the rebels had actually launched the attack. “ "Our investigators have been in neighboring countries interviewing victims, doctors and field hospitals and, according to their report of last week which I have seen, there are...

Recent days saw the Hadar Mall in Jerusalem packed to the gills with Israeli civilians waiting to receive gas masks from the IDF’s Home Front Command. But no lines and no gas masks greeted this reporter Wednesday afternoon, only a sign directing Jerusalem residents to call 104, the Home Front Command’s 24-hour hotline. The number was unavailable most of the day. For the lucky callers who got through, waiting times topped 40 minutes. Only late in the evening did I manage to get through to someone, who informed me that the Jerusalem distribution point was temporarily closed because it “was...

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday the U.S. intelligence community believes the Syrian regime used the chemical weapon sarin, a revelation that immediately raised the question of whether a "red line" had been crossed in the country's civil war. Hagel confirmed the intelligence assessment, which was detailed in a letter to select members of Congress, while speaking to reporters on a visit to Abu Dhabi. The administration swiftly released those letters, which said U.S. intelligence determined with varying degrees of confidence that "the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically the chemical agent sarin."...

War On Terror: As the regime of Bashar Assad disintegrates, the security of his chemical arsenal is in jeopardy. The No. 2 general in Saddam Hussein's air force says they were the WMDs we didn't find in Iraq. King Abdullah of neighboring Jordan warned that a disintegrating Syria on the verge of civil war puts Syria's stockpile of chemical weapons at risk of falling into the hands of al-Qaida. "One of the worst-case scenarios as we are obviously trying to look for a political solution would be if some of those chemical stockpiles were to fall into unfriendly hands," he...

The Syrian military is prepared to use chemical weapons against its own people and is awaiting final orders from President Bashar Assad, U.S. officials told NBC News on Wednesday. The military has loaded the precursor chemicals for sarin, a deadly nerve gas, into aerial bombs that could be dropped onto the Syrian people from dozens of fighter-bombers, the officials said. As recently as Tuesday, officials had said there was as yet no evidence that the process of mixing the "precursor" chemicals had begun. But Wednesday, they said their worst fears had been confirmed: The nerve agents were locked and loaded...

An alleged Islamic militant has told a Belgian court how he plotted to bomb a military base on an al-Qaeda mission. Nizar Trabelsi, a former Tunisian professional footballer, told how Osama Bin Laden's network sent him two years ago to Belgium to bomb the Kleine Brogel base, which houses nuclear missiles. He is one of 23 alleged Islamic militants on trial. Only eight of them are in custody, while five are still on the run and the others face lesser charges. "I was supposed to go alone in a van. The bomb was behind me," Mr Trabelsi told the Brussels...

China detects deadly nerve gas at border with NKorea: report 1 hr 51 mins ago TOKYO (AFP) – China has detected deadly nerve gas at its border with North Korea and suspects an accidental release inside the secretive state, a Japanese news report said Friday. The Chinese military is strengthening its surveillance activities after detecting the highly virulent sarin gas in November last year and in February in Liaoning province, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported, citing anonymous sources from the Chinese military.

SNIPPET: "Fourteen years ago today Aum Shinrikyo released sarin gas on the Tokyo subway." SNIPPET: "A final note - Aum Shinrikyo operatives, on the order of the cult's leader, underwent flight training in Florida. There is no evidence that they made any attempts to use this training. It is just an odd, disturbing coincidence."

<p>Proof of cooperation between Iran and Syria in the proliferation and development of weapons of mass destruction was brought to light Monday in a Jane's Magazine report that dozens of Iranian engineers and 15 Syrian officers were killed in a July 23 accident in Syria.</p>

WASHINGTON, May 16 — Scientists working with the Defense Department have found evidence that a low-level exposure to sarin nerve gas — the kind experienced by more than 100,000 American troops in the Persian Gulf war of 1991 — could have caused lasting brain deficits in former service members. Though the results are preliminary, the study is notable for being financed by the federal government and for being the first to make use of a detailed analysis of sarin exposure performed by the Pentagon, based on wind patterns and plume size. The report, to be published in the June issue...

THE London Tube bombers plotted to kill the Australian cricket team by spraying sarin gas into their change rooms during last year's Ashes series, a friend of the terrorists claims. Al-Qaida commanders allegedly ordered the suicide bombers to get jobs at Edgbaston Cricket Ground and wipe out the Australian and England players. They were instructed to release sarin gas, a highly toxic nerve agent that is one of the world's most dangerous chemical weapons. But cricket-loving terrorist Shehzad Tanweer apparently objected and instead the terrorist cell perpetrated the July 7 underground Tube and bus bombings that killed 56 people and...

AL-QAEDA plotted to murder the entire Australian cricket team in their change rooms during last year's Ashes tour of Britain using sarin nerve gas sprayed by the men who bombed the London Underground. A friend of one of the four bombers who killed 52 people when they bombed trains and buses in the British capital on July 7 last year told The Sunday Times newspaper that the al-Qaeda cell was initially ordered to kill the England and Australian cricket teams during the Edgbaston Test in Birmingham. The claim was made by a family friend of bus bomber Hasib Hussain, who...