Russia and China veto UN resolution to impose sanctions on Syria

• Russia and China have vetoed a UN resolution to impose sanctions on Syria over the alleged use of chemical weapons during the six-year war.
• It is Russia’s seventh veto to protect the Syrian government from UN security council action.
• Russia and China are both permanent members of the UN security council.
• Nine UN council members voted in favour of the resolution and Bolivia voted against, along with China and Russia. Egypt, Ethiopia and Kazakhstan abstained.
• A resolution needs nine votes in favour and no vetoes by any of the five permanent members in order to be adopted.

About resolution:

• Western powers put forward the resolution in response to the results of an investigation by the UN and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
• The international inquiry found Syrian government forces were responsible for three chlorine gas attacks and that Islamic State militants had used mustard gas.
• Chlorine’s use as a weapon is banned under the Chemical Weapons Convention, which Syria joined in 2013.
• If inhaled, chlorine gas turns to hydrochloric acid in the lungs and can kill by burning lungs and drowning victims in body fluids.
• Syrian government has denied its forces have used chemical weapons. Russia has questioned the results of the UN/OPCW inquiry.
• The draft resolution would have banned the sale or supply of helicopters to the Syrian government because the UN/OPCW inquiry found Syrian government forces had used helicopters to drop barrel bombs containing chlorine gas.
• It also proposed targeted sanctions – a travel ban and asset freeze – on 11 Syrian military commanders and officials, as well as on 10 government and related entities.

About Chemical Weapons Convention

• The Convention aims to eliminate an entire category of weapons of mass destruction by prohibiting the development, production, acquisition, stockpiling, retention, transfer or use of chemical weapons by States Parties.
• States Parties, in turn, must take the steps necessary to enforce that prohibition in respect of persons (natural or legal) within their jurisdiction.
• All States Parties have agreed to chemically disarm by destroying any stockpiles of chemical weapons they may hold and any facilities which produced them, as well as any chemical weapons they abandoned on the territory of other States Parties in the past.
•  States Parties have also agreed to create a verification regime for certain toxic chemicals and their precursors  order to ensure that such chemicals are only used for purposes not prohibited.
   

By: Vishal