UNITED NATIONS, April 11. /TASS/. The provocation in Syria’s Douma was what militants needed most of all, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya said on Tuesday after neither of the two draft resolutions on the presumable chemical attack in Syria’s Douma had been passed.
Addressing his counterparts from the United States, France and the United Kingdom, the Russian diplomat posed a rhetorical question what Damascus needed this alleged chemical attack for. "The more so as practically all militants have been evacuated from Douma while whose of them who left the area on April 8 knew nothing about the alleged attack," Nebenzya recalled.
"A provocation was what militants badly needed to receive support from the United States and other Western countries," he stressed.
Some non-governmental organizations, including White Helmets, claim that chemical weapons were used in Douma, Eastern Ghouta, on April 7. According to the statement uploaded to the organization’s website on April 8, chlorine bombs were dropped on the city to kill dozens and poison other local civilians who had to be brought to hospital.
The Russian Foreign Ministry dismissed that as fake news. The Russian Defense Ministry stated that White Helmets were an unreliable source, notorious for disseminating falsehoods. The Russian center for the reconciliation of conflicting parties on April 9 examined Douma to find no traces of chemical weapons. Earlier, various official Russian agencies repeatedly warned that preparations had been underway in different parts of Syria for provocations and simulations of chemical attacks that would be blamed on government forces.