Their bodies had turned to black': Syrian chlorine victims can finally speak out

According to an extensive investigation by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), two yellow cylinders were dropped from a Syrian air force helicopter, crashing through the top floor of one apartment building and landing on a balcony of another, in the eastern Ghouta town of Douma.

At least 43 people choked to death, their blistered bodies blue and black when civil defence workers bought the corpses out to the street. We can escape the bullets and the tanks, but chemicals travel through the air.

[Hamad Shukri, a resident] recalled that there was no explosion, only gas. The adults were throwing water on everyone to try and wash the chemical off, he said. I didn't understand what was happening. I just knew that people were dead.

Read at www.theguardian.com