OPCW Douma

Rather than address the concerns of two veteran inspectors about a Syria cover-up, OPCW Director General Fernando Arias has attacked them with false claims. OPCW sources and newly leaked material expose Arias’ latest Western state-backed deceit. (Part two of two. Read part one of this report here.) The stated mission of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) is to ensure “a world free of chemical weapons.” From his executive suite at The Hague, however, OPCW Director General […]

Facing growing outcry, OPCW Director General Fernando Arias went before the UN and told new falsehoods about his organization’s Syria cover-up scandal — along with more disingenuous excuses to avoid addressing it. Part one of two. Read part two here. Watch Aaron Maté and Piers Robinson discuss this article on Pushback. In the two years since the censorship of a Syria chemical weapons investigation was exposed, the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Fernando Arias, […]

Facing new outcry over the Syria cover-up scandal, OPCW chief Fernando Arias has been caught lying, while the US-UK-France are desperately trying to change the subject. Aaron Maté recaps recent meetings at the EU and UN, where the growing Douma controversy was center stage. The US-UK-France bombed Syria in April 2018 after accusing it of a chemical weapons attack in the city of Douma. Leaks later revealed that OPCW inspectors found no evidence of a Syrian government chemical weapons attack. […]

Speaking to the UN Security Council, Lawrence Wilkerson, the former chief of staff to Colin Powell, calls out the OPCW’s Syria cover-up scandal. Years after renouncing his role in helping to make the phony case for the Iraq war, Lawrence Wilkerson returns to the United Nations Security Council to challenge a new pro-war deception: the OPCW’s Syria cover-up. Lawrence Wilkerson is a retired Army Colonel who served as Chief of Staff to Secretary State Colin Powell. In 2003, Wilkerson helped […]

Speaking to the UN Security Council, veteran diplomat Hans von Sponeck calls out the OPCW’s “stonewalling and unacceptable smear tactics” amid growing outcry over the Syria cover-up scandal.  Returning to the United Nations, veteran German diplomat and former top UN official Hans von Sponeck calls for an end to the stonewalling of accountability for the OPCW’s cover-up of its April 2018 Douma chemical weapons probe. “The manner in which this serious controversy has been handled by OPCW management… has sought […]

In remarks to the UN Security Council, Aaron Maté of The Grayzone debunks the OPCW’s lies about its Syria cover-up scandal and challenges the US and UK on their role. Speaking to the United Nations Security Council, Aaron Maté of The Grayzone takes apart the OPCW’s excuses for refusing to address the organization’s Syria cover-up scandal. OPCW inspectors found no evidence to support allegations of a Syrian government chemical weapons attack in the city of Douma in April 2018. But […]

The BBC’s Chloe Hadjimatheou produced a podcast serial designed to rehabilitate the White Helmets’ late, scandal-stained founder, while blaming critics for his demise. Was she a channel for a wider British intelligence operation? White Helmets founder James Le Mesurier falling to his death from the top floor of his Istanbul home in uncertain circumstances in November 2019 created a myriad of extremely serious problems for a great many powerful people.  At the time, the White Helmets’ intimate ties to jihadist […]

After publishing fraudulent claims in a bid to smear OPCW whistleblowers, Bellingcat has been caught in another subterfuge that contradicts its stated allegiance to “transparency and accountability”: a hidden, external author writing its material. The website Bellingcat promotes itself as a collective of digital sleuths who “pledge allegiance to truth and evidence and abide by the principles of transparency and accountability.” Its self-described “groundbreaking investigations,” especially those aimed at Russia and Syria, have led to fawning Western media endorsements of […]

Prominent signatories and five former OPCW officials are calling on the chemical watchdog to address the cover-up of its chemical weapons investigation in the Syrian city of Douma, and to hear out the dissenting scientists whose findings were censored. Five former officials from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons have joined a group of prominent signatories to urge the OPCW to address the controversy surrounding its investigation of an alleged chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria in April […]

For the first time, OPCW chief Fernando Arias was asked a series of direct questions at the United Nations about the cover-up of a Syria chemical weapons probe. He answered none of them. Russia’s UN ambassador asked Arias about several damning leaks, some revealed by The Grayzone, as well as ongoing deceptive attacks on the veteran scientists who challenged the censorship of their investigation. Arias refused to answer in public session, and gave vague, non-substantive answers in private. Aaron Maté […]