Health Minister Confirms Which Agent Was Used in Syrian Chemical Attack

By Kimberly Ross | 12:45 PM on April 11, 2017

The opinions expressed by contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of RedState.com.

In this picture taken on Tuesday, April 4, 2017, victims of the suspected chemical weapons attack lie on the ground, in Khan Sheikhoun, in the northern province of Idlib, Syria. The death toll from a suspected chemical attack on a northern Syrian town rose to 72 on Wednesday as activists and rescue workers found more terrified survivors hiding in shelters near the site of the harrowing assault, one of the deadliest in Syria's civil war. (Alaa Alyousef via AP)

As expected, the agent used in last week’s attack in the northern Idlib province in Syria was sarin gas. Initially it appeared that chlorine gas had been used.

However, as reported by The Associated Press, the Turkish health minister confirmed on Tuesday that it been sarin gas.

Turkey’s health minister says test results conducted on victims of a chemical attack in northern Syria confirm that sarin gas was used.

Recep Akdag said Tuesday that blood and urine samples taken from the victims confirmed that they were subjected to the nerve agent. His comments were reported by the state-run Anadolu news agency.

Turkey last week conducted autopsies on three victims of the gas attack who were brought from Syria.

Officials from the World Health Organization and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons participated in the autopsies.

As Jay Caruso noted earlier, the Obama administration’s claim that Syria did not possess chemical weapons was an absolute lie.

In 2014, then-Secretary of State John Kerry praised his boss and exclaimed that “100 percent of the declared chemical weapons” were out of Syria. Kerry was adamant that they no longer had access to them. The hope was that all chemical weapons had been removed, but even the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, Ahmet Uzumcu, remained unsure, as Reuters reported at the time.

“All declared chemical weapons have left Syria (but) clearly we cannot say as the secretariat of the OPCW that Syria doesn’t possess any chemical weapons any more,” he added.

That sure doesn’t sound like 100% to me.

Tuesday’s confirmation that Syrian men, women, and children died from sarin gas serves as a deadly reminder of the failure of the Obama administration and other world officials.