Tag Archives: Mustard gas
2 March 2014
The Joint Mission of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and the United Nations confirmed on 26 February 2014 that a shipment of Syria’s reserve of mustard gas has left the country. The Special Coordinator of the Joint Mission, Sigrid Kaag, stated that the shipment is an ‘important step’ in the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal. Following international outrage over a sarin gas attack on civilians in August 2013, the Joint Mission was installed to supervise Syria’s compliance with its obligation to renounce its chemical weapons, agreed to by Assad after negotiations led by the United States and Russia. (more…)
Source: UN News Centre - Joint UN-OPCW mission welcomes mustard gas shipment out of Syria as ‘important step’
Source: Reuters | Syria agrees new April target to remove chemicals: diplomats
25 April 2013
On 24 April 2013, the District Court of the Hague in the Netherlands ordered Frans van Anraat, a Dutch national and former businessman convicted of selling raw materials for mustard gas to Saddam Hussein, to pay compensation to 17 victims of chemical weapon attacks by the regime of Saddam Hussein in 1988.
The case was brought by survivors of attack on the Kurdish city of Halabja in Iraq in 1988, in which an estimated 5,600 civilians were killed.
The judgment raises interesting questions from a shared responsibility perspective, as Van Anraat was only one of many contributors to the eventual injuries (see blog post written by André Nollkaemper here).
Source: Judgment Rechtbank 's-Gravenhage | LJN: BZ8333 | C/09/355125 / HA ZA 09-4324 (in Dutch)
Source: The Washington Post | Dutch court awards compensation to Iraqi, Iranian mustard gas attack survivors
25 April 2013
On 24 April, the District Court of the Hague in the Netherlands ordered Frans van Anraat, a Dutch national, to pay compensation to 17 victims of chemical weapon attacks by the regime of Saddam Hussein in 1988. The judgment raises interesting questions from a shared responsibility perspective, as Van Anraat obviously only was one of many contributors to the eventual injuries.
The case was brought by 17 survivors of the 1988 attack on the Kurdish city of Halabja in Iraq, in which an estimated 5,600 civilians were killed. Saddam Hussein ordered the Halabja attack as part of a crackdown on a Kurdish rebellion in the north, during the final months of the war with Iraq.
In the 2007 judgment in the criminal trial, the Court had found that Van Anraat was Iraq’s sole supplier of a chemical substance used in the production of mustard gas. He had claimed that he believed the chemical was to be used in the Iraqi textile industry. The Court rejected that argument in the criminal trial, saying that he knew the chemicals might well be used for war crimes. Van Anraat is now serving a prison sentence in the Netherlands. (more…)