US: Al-Qaeda working on chemical arms

The United States Attorney™s Office for the Eastern District of New York has said al-Qaeda is running a chemical weapons program and may acquire weapons of mass destruction in the future.

Former FBI assistant director John Miller has said that a document obtained from the office of the US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Loretta Lynch, shows that al-Qaeda linked al-Shabab militants in Somalia are working to develop chemical weapons.

According to the document, three men, including a British national, charged with having ties with Somalia™s al-Qaeda linked al-Shabab militants œhad substantial knowledge regarding an al-Shabaab research and development department that was developing chemical weapons,” said Miller in an interview with CBS News™ This Morning on Thursday.

Earlier this month, WND also reported that classified documents obtained from the US intelligence community™s National Ground Intelligence Center showed the US military confirmed that militants from al-Qaeda linked al-Nusra Front in Syria had sarin gas.

According to the document, al-Qaeda elements in Iraq produced sarin and transferred it to Turkey for use by foreign-backed militants in Syria. The gas was provided to militants in Syria through the Turkish town of Antakya in Hatay Province with Turkey™s cooperation.

The documents obtained by WND also showed that the US military knew sarin gas was used by militants in an attack on civilians and Syrian government forces last March.

Based on the leaked document, former director of the US Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare Yossef Bodansky has argued that a chemical attack on August 21 near capital Damascus was perpetrated by the militants to provoke a US military intervention in Syria.

Washington has claimed that the Syrian government is responsible for the chemical attack of August 21.

Damascus has categorically rejected the allegations and even Obama™s top aide, White House chief of staff Denis McDonough, has admitted that Washington™s claims were based on a œcommon-sense test” not any œirrefutable” evidence.

Meanwhile, Russia has said it has evidence which shows militant groups operating in Syria staged the August 21 attack to incriminate the Syrian government.

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