Russia has vetoed a U.S.-drafted U.N. resolution that would have condemned last weekend's suspected gas attack near Damascus and established a new body to determine responsibility for Syrian chemical weapons attacks.
The vote Tuesday afternoon in the 15-member Security Council was 12 in favor, Bolivia joining Russia in voting "no," and China abstaining.
U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley said the United States "went the extra mile" to get Russian support for the resolution to ensure that a new investigative body would be impartial, independent and professional – things she said would not be guaranteed by a rival Russian resolution.
Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya accused the United States of wanting the resolution to fail "to justify the use of force against Syria."
He said the resolution was trying to recreate the old expert body, whose extension Moscow blocked in November. He called that body "a puppet in the hands of anti-Damascus forces."
Meanwhile, inspectors with the global chemical weapons watchdog will travel to the Syrian town of Douma to investigate reports of an attack there that killed as many as 60 people, the agency said in a statement on Tuesday.
Syria has been asked to "make the necessary arrangements for such a deployment," the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said. "This has coincided with a request from the Syrian Arab Republic and the Russian Federation to investigate the allegations of chemical weapons use in Douma. The team is preparing to deploy to Syria shortly."
The suspected chemical weapons attack late on Saturday wounded more than 1,000 people at several sites in Douma, a town near the capital Damascus, according to the Union of Medical Care Organizations. The Syrian government and its backer Russia deny that chemical weapons were used.
Doctors and eyewitnesses have said victims showed symptoms of poisoning, possibly by a nerve agent, and reported the smell of chlorine gas.
OPCW has an ongoing mandate to investigate suspected chemical weapons attacks in Syria. Its fact-finding mission will determine whether banned munitions were used, but will not assign blame.
It was not immediately clear whether the OPCW's announcement to deploy would delay or prevent a U.S. strike in Syria. U.S. President Donald Trump has vowed to respond "forcefully" to Saturday's attack on civilians and warned that Russia – or any other nation found to share responsibility – will "pay a price."
The incident has sparked international outrage and ratcheted up tensions in the already volatile Mideast, raising the specter of possible imminent American retaliation amid Russia's warnings against any such action.
Adding to the tensions, Iran, a strong ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, threatened to respond to an airstrike on a Syrian military base on Monday that the Syrian government, Russia and Iran blamed on Israel.
Seven Iranians were among the estimated 14 people killed in the missile strike, and a senior Iranian official visiting Damascus said the attack "will not remain unanswered." Ali Akbar Velayati, an aide to Iran's supreme leader, spoke upon arrival in the Syrian capital on Tuesday.
The Syrian air base was struck by missiles a little more than 24 hours after the alleged chemical attack. Israel does not typically comment on its operations in Syria, and it is unclear whether the missile attack was linked to the alleged use of chemical weapons.
Iran is one of Assad's strongest backers and has sent thousands of troops and allied militiamen to support his forces.
Syrian government forces were on high alert and taking precautionary measures Tuesday at military positions across the country amid fears of a U.S. strike in the aftermath of the attack near Damascus.
U.N. Secretary General António Guterres said Tuesday he was outraged by the reported attack, and that the use of chemical weapons would be a violation of international law. He also reaffirmed his support for an OPCW investigation.
Thousands of opposition fighters, along with tens of thousands of civilians, are still in Douma. The rebels agreed to surrender the town to government forces after the suspected gas attack, and have been evacuating in batches to rebel-held areas in the north. Russian military police have since entered parts of the town.
Asked in Berlin about the Russian proposal that OPCW experts visit Douma, German Chancellor Angela Merkel responded unenthusiastically, saying that "the evidence that chemical weapons were used there is very, very clear."
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that Syrian government troops were on a 72-hour alert and were fortifying their positions. The Observatory's chief, Rami Abdurrahman, said the alert includes all army positions and bases from the southern province of Sweida all the way to Aleppo province in the north, the Mediterranean coast in the west to Deir ez-Zor province in the east, along the Iraqi border.
The Sound and Picture Organization, an activist collective in eastern Syria, said that Iranian fighters and members of Lebanon's Hezbollah terrorist group had evacuated their positions in the Boukamal area, near the Iraqi border, which was recently retaken from the Islamic State group.
