World Bulletin/News Desk

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu had a telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart on Wednesday to discuss the alleged use of chemical weapons in war-torn Syria, in which he asked the Iranian foreign minister to put pressure on the Syrian regime to allow UN inspection teams to conduct an investigation into the alleged use of chemical weapons.

According to a press release by the Iranian Embassy in Turkey on Thursday, during the telephone conversation, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Davutoğlu that the use of chemical weapons is not acceptable, adding that even if they had been used, the blame should be placed on the Syrian opposition and not Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The statement added that Zarif said the Iranian authorities are in close contact with the Syrian regime to investigate the allegations.

Foreign Minister Davutoğlu told the press on Thursday that the Syrian regime is denying the use of chemical weapons, adding, “A UN inspection team should be allowed to investigate if the Syrian regime is right in their claim. I called my Iranian counterpart yesterday and requested that he talk to the Syrian regime to ensure that they do not create any troubles for the UN inspection team conducting an investigation.”

The Turkish National Security Council (MGK) strongly condemned the alleged use of chemical weapons near Damascus hours after Syrian activists accused President Assad's forces of launching a gas attack that killed hundreds of people on Wednesday in what would, if confirmed, be by far the worst reported use of chemical arms in the two-year-old civil war.

A leading Syrian opposition figure said 1,300 people had been killed in attacks by Assad's forces around Damascus. “Today's crimes are…not the first time the regime has used chemical weapons,” George Sabra told a news conference in İstanbul. “But they constitute a significant turning point in the regime's operations. … This time it was for annihilation rather than terror.”

The alleged chemical attack has come at a time when a UN chemical inspection team is in Damascus to look for evidence of any use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime during the civil war.