A Syrian filmmaker says Russian state media have used images from the set of his 2016 movie to claim that video footage from an April 7 suspected poison gas attack in Syria was staged.
Humam Husari describes it as a "desperate and cheap attempt by Russian TV to deny the obvious attack on Douma."
The April 22 reports by Russia's Rossiya-1 and Channel One try to back up the Russian and Syrian government narrative that there was no chemical weapons attack in Douma, and that videos purporting to show victims of the attack were faked.
Husari says that in one segment, the reports use behind the scenes images from the set of his short film called "Chemical," as it was being filmed in the eastern Ghouta region in 2016.
Husari told The Associated Press on Wednesday that his production, which is still a work in progress, is a fictional short drama based on the chemical weapons attack in Ghouta that took place in 2013.
- CHEMICAL WEAPONS INSPECTORS VISIT SYRIA'S DOUMA
The global chemical weapons watchdog says its team of inspectors has visited for the second time a Syrian town hit by an alleged chemical attack earlier this month and taken samples.
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said in a statement on Wednesday that samples taken by the team in the town of Douma, just east of Damascus, will be sent to OPCW designated laboratories for analysis.
The OPCW's fact-finding mission visited Douma for the first time over the weekend, two weeks after the April 7 attack. Their entry into the town was delayed by security fears.
More than 40 people were killed in the suspected chemical weapons attack in the town. The OPCW team is mandated to establish whether chemical weapons were used, but not to apportion blame.
