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Madam President, Lithuania voted in favour of and co-sponsored the draft resolution establishing the Joint Investigative Mechanism to identify those involved in the use of chemicals as weapons in Syria. Despite the complete prohibition of the use of chemical weapons being at the core of the Chemical Weapons Convention to which Syria is a state party since October 2013 and the prohibitions contained in the Council resolutions 2118 and 2209 to use, develop, retain or transfer chemical weapons in Syria, the use of toxic chemicals continues to this day with dreadful frequency. Civilians remain the primary targets of such attacks, while spreading fear remains the main objective.

When in August 2013 hundreds died in Ghouta after the Syrian regime used sarin against its own people, a formidable effort by the international community was launched to destroy the regime’s declared stockpiles of chemical weapons. For some time there was hope that Ghouta was the last time we’d ever see chemical weapons use in Syria or anywhere else for that matter. But after Ghouta came Talmenes, Al Tamanah, Kafr Zita, Idlib and others. More helicopters overhead, whistling sounds of falling barrels, and orange plumes of noxious chlorine gas rising above civilian neighbourhoods.

Madam President,

The attacks did not stop after the conclusion by the OPCW Fact Finding Mission in September 2014 that a toxic chemical was used as a weapon, systematically and repeatedly, in the villages of northern Syria. Neither did they stop when this Council – barely five months ago – adopted a second resolution on the subject where it stressed that those responsible for any use of chemicals as weapons must be held accountable and reiterated its readiness to impose measures under Chapter VII in the event of non-compliance.

The resolution we have just adopted is about accountability. The Joint Investigative Mechanism, which we are about to establish, will provide a clear path to identifying those responsible for attacks involving chemical weapons in Syria, whoever they are. That is a crucial step forward, since it will enable to drag the perpetrators out of the shadow of their ugly deeds, put a face on those criminals and thereby send a clear message to other would-be perpetrators that the international community will no longer tolerate such crimes.

This Council must take all the necessary steps to make sure that those responsible for the chemical attacks are brought to justice. Accountability however should not be limited only to those responsible for chemical weapons attacks, but extend to all those who caused death, destruction and unimaginable suffering to the Syrian people during the conflict that started over 4.5 years ago. The Council must not lose sight of this final objective, since we owe it to the memory of hundreds of thousands who lost their lives and to the millions destitute and displaced by the carnage in Syria.

Thank you.