BEIRUT (AP) – One year after the deadly chemical attack on rebel-held areas outside Damascus, the victims and their families have yet to see those behind the mass killings held responsible, a human rights group said Thursday.
In the early hours of Aug. 21, 2013, rockets carrying the nerve agent sarin slammed into the rebel-held suburbs of the Syrian capital of eastern Ghouta and Moadamiyeh. Hundreds were killed in what the U.N. chief called the “worst use of weapons of mass destruction in the 21st century.”
The attack is almost certainly the single deadliest event in Syria’s civil war – a conflict that has killed more than 170,000 people since it began in March 2011.
Following the chemical assault, U.N. inspectors conducted a swift investigation that determined rockets loaded with sarin had been fired from an area where the Syrian military has bases. But the U.N. probe’s limited mandate did not authorize the experts to identify who was responsible for the attack.
The Syrian opposition and its allies, including the United States, accused Damascus of carrying out the attack. President Bashar Assad’s government denied responsibility, and blamed the rebels.