Syrian activists Tuesday accused the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad of launching a chlorine gas attack on the town of Sarmin in Idlib province, killing six members of a family who’d taken refuge in their basement.
The gas, which is heavier than air, filled the basement where Waref Taleb, his wife, mother and three children were hiding. As many as 70 other people were affected by the gas, according to Smart News Network, an opposition group.
Word of the attack came as the Syrian civil war began its fifth year, and five days after the U.N. Security Council condemned the use of chemical weapons in the conflict. The Assad government agreed to surrender its chemical weapons nearly two years ago after it was blamed for an attack in the Damascus suburbs that killed hundreds. But chlorine, which has many industrial uses, was not among the chemicals it was required to destroy. Since then, the opposition has claimed numerous times that chlorine cylinders have been added to improvised explosives known as barrel bombs dropped over cities.
Activists said the barrel bomb in Tuesday’s deaths was dropped by a helicopter.
Muhammad Tanari, the head doctor at Sarmin hospital, told McClatchy that victims of the attack showed no external injuries, but had problems breathing.
The area targeted by the barrel bombs was less than a half mile from a base where al Qaida-affiliated rebels have been massing tanks for an expected assault on government positions in Idlib, the capital of the province by the same name. Opposition media activists in the area have reported in recent days that the government has been enhancing its defenses and removing property from government buildings in the city.
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