DAMASCUS (Dispatches) – Terrorists in the northwestern province of Idlib are preparing a chemical attack to frame the Syrian army, according to the state news agency SANA quoted Syrian Foreign Ministry as saying.
In a statement, the ministry said the terrorists in cooperation with the so-called White Helmet group and under the Turkish support are preparing to fabricate a chemical attack in Idlib.
Two tons of chemical substances have been brought to a village in southwestern Idlib over the past two days as part of the preparation for the attack, it said.
The ministry urged the countries supporting the terrorists to stop such "games that have only left civilian victims.”
The ministry echoed the government’s stance that the Syrian troops don’t possess chemical weapons and have never used them.
The Russian armed forces also warned on Monday that they have received notice that terrorists from the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham are planning the provocative attacks.
Rear Admiral Alexander Grinkevich, deputy head of the Russian Defense Ministry’s Center for Reconciliation of Opposing Sides in Syria, said in a briefing that terrorists in the Syrian province of Idlib are planning to stage chemical weapons attacks in two villages as a ploy to frame the Syrian armed forces.
The Russian military official urged the commanders of terrorist groups in Syria to take the path of peaceful settlement in the region.
The Syrian government surrendered its stockpiles of chemical weapons in 2014 to a joint mission led by the UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), which oversaw the destruction of the weaponry. However, Western governments and their allies have never stopped pointing the finger at Damascus whenever an apparent chemical attack has taken place.
Shelling resumed between the Syrian army and the terrorists on Wednesday in the southern countryside of Idlib.
Idlib has emerged as the last major terrorist stronghold in Syria.