US bans entry of Syrian generals over chemical attack in 2013

The United States has banned three Syrian generals from entering the country for violating human rights in a chemical weapons bombardment of the Ghouta area, outside Damascus, which killed 1,400 people in August 2013.

The sanctioned generals are Adnan Abud Hilweh, Gasan Ahmed Ganem and Yaudat Salibi Mauás, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement on Monday.

The leader of US diplomacy recalled that on August 21, 2013, the Syrian armed forces bombed Ghouta, controlled at the time by the opposition, with sarin gas, killing 1,400 people, many of them children.

“As a result of the measures taken today, neither Hilweh, nor Ganem, nor Mauás, nor any of their direct family members, can enter the United States,” Blinken said, adding that the United States “honors and remembers” the victims and survivors. of the massacre.

The foreign minister criticized that the “atrocities” committed by the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the war in his country include war crimes and crimes against humanity, such as the use of chemical weapons against civilians.

“We condemn in the strongest possible terms any use of chemical weapons anywhere, by anyone, under any circumstances,” Blinken said.

For this reason, he demanded that the Syrian authorities “completely destroy” their entire chemical arsenal and allow “immediate access” to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

Likewise, he promised to find a way to do justice for the victims of the atrocities that took place in Syria and “promote the accountability of those responsible.”

He also said that the United States “will continue to support the demands of the Syrian people for human rights, freedoms, peace and security.”