BEIRUT/AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian activists accused President Bashar al-Assad's forces of launching a gas attack that killed more than 200 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.
Images, including some taken by photographers working for Reuters, showed scores of bodies including of small children, laid out on the floor of a medical clinic with no visible signs of injuries. Reuters was not independently able to verify the cause of their death.
Syrian state television denied government forces had used poison gas and said the accusations were intended to distract a team of United Nations chemical weapons experts which arrived three days ago.
Activists said rockets with chemical agents hit the Damascus suburbs of Ain Tarma, Zamalka and Jobar during fierce pre-dawn bombardment by government forces.
Children who survived what activists say is a gas attack is seen along a street in the Duma neighbou …
A nurse at Douma Emergency Collection facility, Bayan Baker, said the death toll, as collated from medical centers in the suburbs east of Damascus, was at least 213. Activists said many hundreds had been killed.
