Agencies/Riyadh

 

Saudi Arabia yesterday urged “stern” world action against Syria after the regime’s decision to hold presidential elections and its alleged use of toxic gas against civilians.

Saudi Arabia is one of the main backers of the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Syria’s plan to hold elections is “an escalation and undermines Arab and international efforts to peacefully resolve the crisis based on the (outcomes of) the Geneva I conference”, said Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal.

A 2012 peace conference in the Swiss city called for a transitional government ahead of free and fair elections, with no mention of Assad’s role in the transition.

Syrian daily Al Watan reported yesterday that the date for the presidential elections will be announced next week and is expected to be around June.

The international community has criticised Syria’s plan to go ahead with the vote, which would likely see Assad win another seven-year mandate.

This decision, “as well as dangerous information on the regime’s recent use of toxic gases against civilians in the town of Kafr Zita”, in the central Hama province, represent “clear defiance” of the UN Security Council, Faisal said in Riyadh.

Asked about the possibility of supplying anti-aircraft weapons to the rebels, Prince Saud said that it was necessary to change the balance of military power on the ground in Syria but did not give further details.

"The only way the regime would listen to calls for peace is if he (Assad) is forced to agree that we cannot reach a military solution for his desire to quell the revolution," he said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said residents choking from poisoning in the rebel-held town of Kafr Zita were hospitalised after bombing raids on Friday.

Activists in the area accused the regime of using chlorine gas, saying it caused “more than 100 cases of suffocation”.

But state television claimed that the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al Nusra Front, a key force in the revolt, had released chlorine in an attack on the town.

More than 150,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflict broke out in March 2011, according to the Observatory.

Chlorine gas, a deadly agent widely used in World War I, has industrial uses and is not on a list of chemical weapons that Assad declared to the global chemical weapons watchdog last year for destruction.

"Chlorine was not part of the declared stockpile but chlorine is a chemical weapon under the chemical weapon convention," said Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, CEO of SecureBio, a UK-based consultancy firm.

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