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You really, really, really, really couldn't make it up .... (Original Post) non sociopath skin Sep 2013 OP
Meh - they're general chemicals, they didn't actually get there, and other media has covered it muriel_volestrangler Sep 2013 #1
What would I do without you, Mu? non sociopath skin Sep 2013 #2
Times have changed..... Little Star Sep 2013 #5
The Corporate Owned Media Monopoly decides WHAT you need to know. blkmusclmachine Sep 2013 #3
I posted about this today in GD (had not seen your post in here).... Little Star Sep 2013 #4
The Mail on Sunday does hype an awful lot of things muriel_volestrangler Sep 2013 #6
All of that is true. However, as The Telegram pointed out.... Little Star Sep 2013 #7
No, there was not a civil war in Syria from 2004 to 2010 muriel_volestrangler Sep 2013 #8
The telegram dated 01 Sep 2013 says..... Little Star Sep 2013 #9

non sociopath skin

(4,972 posts)
2. What would I do without you, Mu?
Thu Sep 5, 2013, 08:22 AM
Sep 2013


... though I'm still not sure why we should be flogging potentially dangerous chemicals to a country in the middle of a civil war.

Sigh. I'd never make an entrepreneur, would I?

The Skin

Little Star

(17,055 posts)
5. Times have changed.....
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 10:14 AM
Sep 2013


There are now laws in Britain regulating the sale. It's not just for teeth strengthening and such anymore.

Little Star

(17,055 posts)
4. I posted about this today in GD (had not seen your post in here)....
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 10:10 AM
Sep 2013

But I started off with a link to the Daily Mail. Go take a look at what happened in my post. DU doesn't even appear to find it worthy of mention either. I don't get it.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023622082

Denial is not just a river.

k&r for your OP.

muriel_volestrangler

(101,144 posts)
6. The Mail on Sunday does hype an awful lot of things
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 11:19 AM
Sep 2013

This was covered earlier:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014582529
http://election.democraticunderground.com/10023586419

and it is a chemical with several legitimate uses. Syria was not under general sanctions in that period. If Britain had forbidden the sale, I'm sure Russia would have sold it to them instead. It's the kind of chemical with multiple vendors in China:

http://www.alibaba.com/showroom/sodium-fluoride.html

Calling sodium fluoride a 'Sarin agent' in the headline is rather misleading of the Mail. It's a a chemical you can use to make sarin. Normally, 'sarin agent' wold be used to refer to sarin itself - you talk about a 'nerve agent', or someone says "Syrian Army Seized two Containers with Sarin Agent" - that doesn't mean they seized some sodium fluoride. So "UK delivered Sarin agent to Syrian regime for SIX years" is a misleading headline.

Little Star

(17,055 posts)
7. All of that is true. However, as The Telegram pointed out....
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 11:50 AM
Sep 2013

6 days before the Daily Mail, "The dual-use substances can be used as chemical weapon precursors, and are listed on the international schedule."

They knew very well of those duel-usages and there was a long on going civil war raging in Syria. Why do you think Thomas Docherty MP, a member of the Commons Arms Export Controls Committee, said: ‘These are very disturbing revelations uncovered by The Mail on Sunday regarding the provision of sodium fluoride to Syria. At no time should we have allowed President Assad’s regime to get its hands on this substance?

muriel_volestrangler

(101,144 posts)
8. No, there was not a civil war in Syria from 2004 to 2010
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 12:38 PM
Sep 2013

which is the time the Mail is talking about. There was a licence granted in the early stages of the civil war in 2011, and then the international community decided that exports to Syria needed to be restricted; the sale covered by that 2011 licence never actually happened. Sodium fluoride is a widely used chemical:

It is not surprising that many of the individual precursor chemicals on the AGL are also covered under the CWC schedules, either as an individually listed chemical or as a member of a family of chemicals. However, because of the more limited and highly focussed nature of the objectives of the AGL, some of the precursor chemicals which are early in the production process and/or are widely produced in industry (and hence not considered suitable for effective monitoring under the CWC) have been included on the AGL, because they are either known or suspected to have been sought for CW purposes. Such precursors include:

• the fluoride chemicals (chemicals 14, 24, 41, 42, 43 and 44) for the production of sarin-family nerve agents…

14. potassium fluoride [7789-23-3]
24. hydrogen fluoride [7664-39-3]
41. potassium bifluoride [7789-29-9]
42. ammonium bifluoride [1341-49-7]
43. sodium bifluoride [1333-83-1]
44. sodium fluoride [7681-49-4]

http://www.fluoridealert.org/news/a-comparison-of-the-australia-group-list-of-chemical-weapon-precursors-and-the-cwc-schedules-of-chemicals/


Why is Docherty saying that? Because he wants his name in the papers, that's why.

Little Star

(17,055 posts)
9. The telegram dated 01 Sep 2013 says.....
Sun Sep 8, 2013, 01:41 PM
Sep 2013
They licensed the sale of potassium fluoride and sodium fluoride last January, 10 months after the bloody uprising began.

The revelations come as the US Secretary of State John Kerry claimed to have evidence that sarin gas was used in last month’s atrocity in Damascus which killed nearly 1500 people, including 426 children.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10279790/Government-allowed-export-of-nerve-gas-chemicals-to-Syria.html


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