A civil defence member breathes through an oxygen mask, after what rescue workers described as a suspected gas attack in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in rebel-held Idlib, Syria, April 4, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Abdullah/Files

 

UNITED NATIONS: US President Donald Trump on Thursday urged the UN Security Council (UNSC) to renew an international inquiry into chemical weapons attacks in Syria ahead of planned votes on rival US and Russia resolutions that could spark Moscow?s 10th veto on Syria action.

Trump said on Twitter that the joint inquiry by the UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), which decided who is to blame, was needed to prevent Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from using chemical weapons.

The inquiry, known as the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM), found the Syrian government used the banned nerve agent sarin in an April 4 attack. If the Security Council cannot agree on a renewal, its mandate will expire at midnight Thursday.

?Need all on the UN Security Council to vote to renew the Joint Investigative Mechanism for Syria to ensure that Assad Regime does not commit mass murder with chemical weapons ever again,? Trump said in a note on Twitter.

A resolution needs nine votes in favour and no vetoes by the United States, France, Russia, Britain or China to be adopted.

While Russia agreed to the 2015 creation of the JIM, it has consistently questioned its findings, which also concluded that the Syrian government used chlorine as a weapon several times.

Diplomats say there is little support among the 15-member council for the Russian draft, which Russian UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia has said aims to correct ?systemic errors? of the inquiry,

Diplomats said the United States had amended its draft in a bid to win Russian support.

Russia has vetoed nine resolutions on Syria since the conflict started in 2011, including blocking an initial US bid on October 24 to renew the JIM, saying it wanted to wait for the release two days later of the inquiry?s report that blamed a sarin gas attack on the Syrian government.

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Russia and the United States.