Syria says US evidence of chemical attack fabricated

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus Damascus said Friday that a US intelligence report concluding that the Syrian regime used chemical weapons in an onslaught that killed close to 1,500 people was "entirely fabricated". "What the US administration describes as irrefutable evidence is nothing but tired legends that the terrorists have been circulating for more than a week, with their share of lies and entirely fabricated stories," a foreign ministry statement read out on state television said.
A US intelligence report released on Friday concluded the regime had launched a chemical onslaught in the suburbs of Damascus last week, killing 1,429 people, including at least 426 children.
US Secretary of State John Kerry said that the report gathered evidence from thousands of sources and that the intelligence community has "high confidence" that the regime was responsible for the attack.
But in its statement, the Syrian foreign ministry dismissed the report as a poorly crafted document informed mostly by social media.
It expressed surprise that "a superpower could mislead its opinion so clumsily, relying on evidence that does not exist, and that the United States could base policies on matters of war and peace on social media and websites."
Meanwhile, President Barack Obama said the United States was weighing "limited, narrow" action against Syria, as UN inspectors left the country Saturday and opened a window into a possible strike.
Obama emphasised he had made no "final decision" on unleashing military strikes against Bashar al-Assad's regime, but gave his clearest indication yet that an attack was imminent.
UN experts left Syria and crossed by land into Lebanon in a convoy early Saturday after completing their investigation into the attacks around Damascus and said they would "expedite" a report on whether chemical weapons had been used there.
The team is due to report back immediately to UN chief Ban Ki-moon, who has appealed to the West to allow time for their findings to be assessed.
Source: AFP