Zarif Raps West’s Support for 1980s Gas Attacks on Iran

TEHRAN (defapress) – Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif lambasted the West for supporting and the UN Security Council for turning a blind eye to the deadly gas attacks that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein launched on Iranian civilians in the 1980s.

News ID: 77925

Date: 30 June 2019 - 19:27

In a post on his Twitter account on Saturday, Zarif paid tribute to the victims of the tragic chemical bombing of Iran’s northwestern city of Sardasht by the Saddam regime back in 1987.

“On June 28, we commemorate the horrific chemical attack on our civilians in Sardasht, Iran,” he said.

“We'll never forget that Western world supported & armed Saddam--even with chemical weapons,” the Iranian minister stressed.

“Security Council never condemned his gassing of our people,” Zarif deplored.

“We persevered then, and will now,” he underlined.

Located in Iran's northwestern province of West Azarbaijan, Sardasht was the third city in the world after Japan’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki to become a target of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).

On June 28 and 29, 1987, Iraqi bombers attacked 4 crowded parts of Sardasht with chemical bombs and engulfed its residents, women and children, young and old, with fatal chemical gases.

The attacks killed 116 citizens and injured over 5,000.

In a message to a Friday ceremony held to mark the anniversary of the tragic attack, Zarif said, “This stain of disgrace will remain on the foreheads of the perpetrators and supporters of this crime forever.”

“The Islamic Republic of Iran, in accordance with the legal, religious and ethical norms on the prohibition of weapons of mass destruction, insists on its principled policy of condemning the use of chemical weapons at any time, any place and under any circumstances, and considers the complete elimination of the remaining stockpiles of chemical weapons of the US, the only holder of those weapons…, as a key step towards achieving a world free of WMDs,” Zarif stated in the message.

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