The international chemical weapons watchdog on Saturday said a team of inspectors had visited the site of an alleged chemical weapons attack in the Syrian town of Douma in Eastern Ghouta.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said the fact-finding mission team had collected samples for analysis from the site of the alleged April 7 attack, which resulted in retaliatory missile strikes by the United States, Britain and France.

Read more: Airstrikes in Syria: What you need to know

Earlier on Saturday, Russia's Foreign Ministry said the OPCW team was on its way to Douma. The OPCW's team had been delayed for several days as it tried to reach the site. France and the United States accused Russia of obstructing access to the site.

"The security of the OPCW has been guaranteed not only by the Syrian side but also by the Russian command in Syria," Russia's Foreign Ministry said.

Russia supports Syrian President Bashar Assad's army and has denied claims that Syrian forces carried out the alleged attack.

"The samples collected will be transported to the OPCW Laboratory in Rijswijk and then dispatched for analysis to the OPCW's designated labs," the OPCW said.

Based on the analysis of the sample results and other information and materials, the team will compile a report to be submitted to the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention for their consideration.

"The OPCW will evaluate the situation and consider future steps including another possible visit to Douma," the OPCW said.

Also on Saturday in Syria, anti-regime fighters and civilians were bused out of a northeast Damascus suburb, after rebel forces agreed to cede the territory Assad's forces, which are backed by Russia and Iran.

State news agency SANA said buses started leaving a town in East Qalamun, 40 kilometers (25 miles) northeast of Damascus.

Syrian state television reported 3,200 militants and their families were to be transported to Idlib and Jarabulus, a rebel-held area along the Turkish border.

Earlier this week, rebels agreed to surrender the town of Dumayr, an enclave northeast of Damascus. About 5,000 people, including 1,500 fighters, left the town.

Each evening at 1830 UTC, DW's editors send out a selection of the day's hard news and quality feature journalism. You can sign up to receive it directly here.</s>International experts from the global agency for the monitoring of chemical weapons set off to the site of a suspected April 7 gas attack in Syria on Saturday, Russia’s foreign ministry said.

Inspectors from the Organization of the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were delayed for one week in Damascus before they could visit the town, just minutes’ away from the capital, where the alleged attack occurred.

The town of Douma was at the time under rebel control and facing a ferocious government air and ground assault. Militants gave up the town days after the alleged attack.

The U.S., France, and Britain blamed the Syrian government for the attack, and struck suspected Syrian chemical weapons facilities one week later.

The Syrian government and its ally Russia denied responsibility for the attack.

Russian ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the delays to the OPCW team were “unacceptable,” in a statement Saturday.

A U.N. security team touring Douma on Tuesday came under small arms and explosives fire, leading the OPCW to postpone its visit.

The U.S. and Britain accused the Syrian government and Russia of delaying the investigation to stage a cover up.

Images that emerged from Douma in the hours after the attack showed lifeless bodies collapsed in crowded rooms, some with foam around their noses and mouths.

Medical workers and activists in Douma at the time said at least 40 people were killed.

Thousands of people — rebels and civilians — left Douma on buses to north Syria in the days after the attack, believing they could not reconcile with the government after it took over the town. North Syria is divided between opposition, Turkish, and al-Qaida control.

The evacuations were the latest in a string of population transfers around the Syrian capital that have displaced more than 60,000 people as the government reconsolidates control after seven years of civil war.

U.N. officials and human rights groups say the evacuations amount to a forced population displacement that may be a war crime.

On Saturday, rebels began evacuating three towns in the eastern Qalamoun region in the Damascus countryside, state TV reported.

State-run Al-Ikhbariya TV said several buses left the towns of Ruhaiba, Jayroud, and al-Nasriya carrying hundreds of rebels and their families to opposition territory in north Syria.

The station said there could be 3,200 rebels leaving three towns on Saturday. It said the evacuations will continue for three days.

Syrian government forces will take over the towns once the departures are complete.</s>Mary Lou McDonald is almost as popular as the Taoiseach.

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Chemical weapons experts have inspected the site of a suspected attack in Syria which caused an international crisis.

Their samples from Douma could help resolve the dispute between Russia and the western allies about whether chemical weapons were used there.

The problems in Syria are top of the agenda at the UN Security Council meeting in Sweden this weekend.

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The five persons on board were transferred to the Coast Guard boat and brought to Howth Harbour

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He also appeared in the first Harry Potter movie.</s>"The samples collected will be transported to the OPCW Laboratory in Rijswijk and then dispatched for analysis to the OPCW’s designated labs," the OPCW said in a statement.

"The OPCW will evaluate the situation and consider future steps including another possible visit to Douma," the organization added.

The mission is investigating an incident that took place in the town on April 7: what the West considers a chemical attack conducted by the government, Moscow views as a provocation carried out to justify a strike on the country.

The Pentagon has admitted that it does not have any solid proof of the attack but still teamed up with the French and the British and launched over 100 missiles on Syria on the very day the OPCW groups was slated to enter Douma. Damascus, Moscow and Tehran branded the move as aggression against Syria's sovereignty.</s>OPCW inspectors arrived in Damascus just hours before the April 15 strikes but were delayed from visiting the site until Saturday, leading Western officials and Syrian activists to accuse Russia and the Syrian government of staging a cover-up. “I won’t find any hope in my heart until the Assad regime is held accountable and eradicated from government in Syria,” said Bilal Abou Salah, a Douma media activist who left the town after the government takeover. He said he feared Russian and Syrian government personnel destroyed potential evidence in the two weeks since the alleged attack.</s>Inspectors from the world's chemical arms watchdog arrived Saturday in the Syrian town of Douma, where an alleged chemical attack took place earlier this month, the Russian foreign ministry said.

A team from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have been in Syria for a week but had not travelled to the city because of security fears.

"According to the information we have, the special OPCW mission... arrived on the morning of April 21 in the city of Douma at the sites suspected of having toxic substances," the ministry said in a statement.

"The security of the OPCW has been guaranteed not only by the Syrian side but also by the Russian command in Syria."

Dozens were killed in the suspected gas attack in Douma, near Damascus, on April 7, widely blamed on President Bashar al-Assad's forces, according to emergency workers.

The Syrian government has consistently denied using chemical arms and invited the OPCW to investigate.

The Russian ministry said it expects the OPCW to carry out an "impartial investigation".

"Especially since this is the first visit to the scene of a suspected chemical incident in the history of the so-called Syrian chemical record," it said.</s>BEIRUT (AP) - International experts from the global agency for the monitoring of chemical weapons set off to the site of a suspected April 7 gas attack in Syria on Saturday, Russia’s foreign ministry said.

Inspectors from the Organization of the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were delayed for one week in Damascus before they could visit the town, just minutes’ away from the capital, where the alleged attack occurred.

The town of Douma was at the time under rebel control and facing a ferocious government air and ground assault. Militants gave up the town days after the alleged attack.

The U.S., France, and Britain blamed the Syrian government for the attack, and struck suspected Syrian chemical weapons facilities one week later.

The Syrian government and its ally Russia denied responsibility for the attack.

Russian ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the delays to the OPCW team were “unacceptable,” in a statement Saturday.

A U.N. security team touring Douma on Tuesday came under small arms and explosives fire, leading the OPCW to postpone its visit.

The U.S. and Britain accused the Syrian government and Russia of delaying the investigation to stage a cover up.

Images that emerged from Douma in the hours after the attack showed lifeless bodies collapsed in crowded rooms, some with foam around their noses and mouths.

Medical workers and activists in Douma at the time said at least 40 people were killed.

Thousands of people - rebels and civilians - left Douma on buses to north Syria in the days after the attack, believing they could not reconcile with the government after it took over the town. North Syria is divided between opposition, Turkish, and al-Qaida control.

The evacuations were the latest in a string of population transfers around the Syrian capital that have displaced more than 60,000 people as the government reconsolidates control after seven years of civil war.

U.N. officials and human rights groups say the evacuations amount to a forced population displacement that may be a war crime.

On Saturday, rebels began evacuating three towns in the eastern Qalamoun region in the Damascus countryside, state TV reported.

State-run Al-Ikhbariya TV said several buses left the towns of Ruhaiba, Jayroud, and al-Nasriya carrying hundreds of rebels and their families to opposition territory in north Syria.

The station said there could be 3,200 rebels leaving three towns on Saturday. It said the evacuations will continue for three days.

Syrian government forces will take over the towns once the departures are complete.</s>After several days of delay, chemical weapons experts entered Syria's Douma on Saturday to investigate an alleged deadly chemical attack there on April 7.

Medics and rescuers have said more than 40 people were killed in the then rebel-held town, while Damascus and its ally Moscow have dismissed the accusations as "fabrications".

Two weeks after the alleged chlorine and sarin attack, and amid warnings Syria's regime may have attempted to tamper with evidence, what clues might the team be looking for?

Despite the long delay, inspectors of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) could still be able to find chemical traces useful for the probe, experts have told AFP.

Evidence could be found in the bodies of alleged victims or in the environment near the site of the suspected attack.

"Autopsy samples, if available, will provide invaluable evidence," said Alastair Hay, professor of environmental toxicology at the University of Leeds.

And "nerve agents like sarin can be present in the environment for many weeks after use and particularly if you look near the site where a weapon has exploded," he told AFP.

Ralf Trapp, a consultant and a previous member of an OPCW mission to Syria, said chlorine gas would be harder to find as it would largely have dissipated into the air.

Instead, as chlorine already exists in the environment, investigators might look for unusually high concentrations of the element in materials from the alleged attack site, he told AFP.

Since April 7, thousands of rebels and civilians have been transferred out of Douma on buses to the north of Syria, and Russian and regime security forces have entered the reconquered town.

A member of the White Helmets, civil defence volunteers who reported the attack along with local medics, said they feared the regime had tampered with the burial site of the victims.

But experts said investigators could detect if someone had tried to hide clues.

"You can erase evidence but you need to be thorough. And in being thorough you may well provide clear evidence that the site has been tampered with," Hay said.

Trapp said "cleaning up a contaminated site would involve the removal of materials that cannot easily be decontaminated".

This "would leave signs that things have been removed, in particular if there is video evidence from ​the time of the alleged attack" for a comparison, he told AFP.

Even after extensive cleaning, "there is a good chance that deposits of the agents or of their degradation products" would remain, he said.

These could be found in materials such as brickwork, concrete and soil, he said.

The team "will bring back all the relevant evidence its inspectors find, including of any clean-up or manipulation" at the site of the alleged attack, Trapp said.

The samples will then be sent off to approved independent laboratories around the world. Each sample is split and sent to at least two different labs.

"If the mission cannot demonstrate that chlorine or sarin were used as weapons at the site, they would present the evidence they have and point to possible scenarios that might explain" it, he said.

It would then "be up to the political organs of the OPCW and to individual states parties to decide whether the evidence was sufficient to confirm a chemical weapons attack or not," he said.

The OPCW is mandated with determining whether or not a chemical weapon was used, but not with deciding who might have carried out such an attack.</s>AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A team of inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) visited a site in Douma, Syria on Saturday to collect samples as it tries to determine whether such weapons were used there on April 7, the agency said.

In a statement, the OPCW said it would now evaluate and consider whether the team needs to make a second visit to Douma.

Samples will be transported back to the Netherlands and onward to the organization’s network of designated labs for analysis.

Based on the analysis of the sample results as well other information and materials collected by the team, the mission would compile a report and submit it to the organization’s member states, the statement said.

The OPCW has been investigating use of toxic chemicals in Syria’s civil war since 2014. Inspectors had been trying to reach Douma for several days but were delayed after an advance security detail was fired upon on April 17.

The OPCW team will attempt to determine whether chemical weapons were used and if so, which. It is not mandated to conclude which side in the conflict used them.</s>A Syrian flag flutters along a damaged street at the city of Douma in Damascus Thomson Reuters AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A team of inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) visited a site in Douma, Syria on Saturday to collect samples as it tries to determine whether such weapons were used there on April 7, the agency said.

In a statement, the OPCW said it would now evaluate and consider whether the team needs to make a second visit to Douma.

Samples will be transported back to the Netherlands and onward to the organization's network of designated labs for analysis.

Based on the analysis of the sample results as well other information and materials collected by the team, the mission would compile a report and submit it to the organization's member states, the statement said.

The OPCW has been investigating use of toxic chemicals in Syria's civil war since 2014. Inspectors had been trying to reach Douma for several days but were delayed after an advance security detail was fired upon on April 17.

The OPCW team will attempt to determine whether chemical weapons were used and if so, which. It is not mandated to conclude which side in the conflict used them.
The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons takes samples from the site of a chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria.