Warning for Assad after latest attack

Syrian President Bashar Assad. Photo / AP

The Syrian Government may be developing new types of chemical weapons, and United States President Donald Trump is prepared to consider further military action if necessary to deter chemical attacks, senior US officials say.

The claims come amid reports of continued chemical attacks in Syria. A besieged neighbourhood in Damascus yesterday appeared to have suffered a chemical attack - the third in as many weeks - as Bashar al-Assad's regime increases pressure on the last remaining rebel strongholds.

Assad is believed to have secretly kept part of Syria's chemical weapons stockpile despite a US-Russian deal under which Damascus was supposed to have handed over all such weapons for destruction in 2014, the US officials said.

Assad's forces have instead "evolved" their chemical weapons and made continued occasional use of them in smaller amounts since a deadly attack last April that drew a US missile strike on a Syrian air base, the officials told reporters in a briefing.

Characteristics of some of those recent attacks suggest that Syria may be developing new weapons and methods for delivering poison chemicals, possibly to make it harder to trace their origin, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity, but they declined to provide specifics.

A deadly sarin attack on a rebel-held area in April last year prompted Trump to order a missile strike on the Shayrat air base, from which the Syrian operation is said to have been launched.

"We reserve the right to use military force to prevent or deter the use of chemical weapons," one official said, while declining to specify how serious a chemical attack would have to be to draw a military response.

A second official said, however, that the Trump Administration hopes that stepped-up international sanctions and diplomatic pressure will help rein in Assad's chemical weapons programme.

In yesterday's attack, missiles hit Douma, in the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta, reportedly spreading chlorine gas over the area. More than 20 civilians, including children, and a civil defence worker were taken to hospital with breathing difficulties.

Douma local council accused the Assad regime of "the deliberate targeting of populated areas using surface-to-surface missiles loaded with chlorine".

"Today Douma woke up breathing chlorine in the western neighbourhoods," said a nurse in the area.

"Only the sun can protect us. The international community has abandoned us."

Firas Abdullah, an opposition activist, posted videos on social media of himself covering his mouth with a scarf as he examined the cases of three missiles. Elliot Higgins, a British-based weapons analyst, said the serial numbers indicated they were from the same batch as those used in a January attack in the area.

Almost 400,000 people in Eastern Ghouta have been under siege by the Government and allied militia since 2013. It is the last major rebel position near the capital and was the site of the deadliest chemical attack by regime forces, in 2013.

- Telegraph Group Ltd, Reuters