OPCW admits it suppressed key dissenter in Douma chemical cover-up

In its defeat at an international tribunal, the OPCW has acknowledged that it shunned an inspector who challenged the Douma chemical cover-up. OPCW whistleblower Dr. Brendan Whelan details the closing chapter of his bid for justice.

The wheels of justice turn slowly but grind exceedingly fine, they say. A recent ruling from the Geneva-based Tribunal of the International Labour Organisation (ILOAT) ordered my former employer the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to reverse its decision to sanction me for alleged breaches of confidentiality and to pay damages. After six years of legal wrangling, the time-worn adage has rung true.

But it isn’t an absolute win or a victory in the true sense. My success at the ILOAT was a correction to a single wrongdoing in the context of a much larger continuing deception being perpetrated by the world’s chemical watchdog and Nobel Peace Laureate.

Neither was it my success. As much as anything, it was a triumph for those who, during the last eight years, have supported the inspectors who challenged the OPCW over its investigation into the alleged chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria, in April 2018. I was part of that probe, and a witness to how it had been manipulated, ostensibly to serve a pre-ordained conclusion.

I am referring, of course, to people like Ambassador José Bustani, the first director general of the OPCW who has been steadfast in supporting the inspectors in our fight for transparency. And individuals like Dr Piers Robinson, former UN Assistant Secretary-General Hans von Sponeck, and Professor Richard Falk the former UN special rapporteur for Palestine, who, together with Mr. Bustani, as directors of the BerlinGroup21 , have been instrumental in advancing the quest for OPCW accountability.

Or journalists like Peter Hitchens , Tucker Carlson , Caitlin Johnstone , and, above all, Aaron Maté of The Grayzone who made the Douma story his and has been doggedly pursuing it for years, and without whom we inspectors would be voiceless. I include members of the Brussels Panel  who were the first to take up the mantle of defending the inspectors. And the signatories of the Statement of Concern , like the four former OPCW team leaders, and musician and activist Roger Waters. Even some politicians who protested. Tulsi Gabbard and former Members of the European Parliament,  Mick Wallace and Claire Daly , who risked their own re-election prospects by speaking out.

Without these people, who, for their stance, were targeted systematically with smears and ad hominem attacks on their integrity, the OPCW cover-up would have remained the dark secret of those who perpetrated it and those knowledgeable of it but too scared or unwilling to speak out.

Having said that, it should be stressed that the OPCW not only was, but still is an extraordinary body, staffed by consummate professionals who fervently believe in its mission. During the 2013-14 removal of Assad’s chemical weapons from Syria, in the midst of a raging civil war, it was the OPCW at its best, and the Nobel Peace Prize was a fitting tribute to its extraordinary legacy. It is an organisation I am proud to have served for nearly 17 years.

When I call out the OPCW in the context of the Douma scandal, I am referring to a very specific and tiny element within the Organisation that I believe has been coopted to serve the interests of powerful external actors. The sell-out is the machinations of just a few; individuals in key positions, who, for whatever motives, have embroiled this world-class body in a damning controversy through their willingness to even corrupt science itself.

Now finally, as a direct result of a legal case at an international Tribunal, their deceit, in a gratifying nod to poetic justice, has been confirmed, literally through the Organisation’s own admission.

The ILOAT ruling didn’t just vindicate me personally and those who stood behind the inspectors. While the focus of the ILOAT case was my unlawful sanctioning, the drawn-out legal process threw up some unexpected  and damning admissions about the Douma  probe.

Where years of public demands and outcry barely elicited a response, faced with a formal legal challenge the OPCW outed itself, perhaps inadvertently, by unequivocally confirming before the Tribunal the core allegations of the dissenting inspectors: that critical evidence in the Douma investigation was withheld ; that the Organisation unfairly targeted dissenting inspectors with spurious claims of breaching confidentiality; and that management sidelined inspectors and refused to engage with them over their concerns.

The first two confirmations are now public. Now for the third.

Sounding the Alarm

On 1 March 2019, six months after I’d departed the organisation, the final report—concluding there were reasonable grounds to believe there had been a chlorine gas attack in Douma—was published by the OPCW. But—a…