A Free Syrian Army fighter gives ammunition to a fellow fighter who is wearing a gas mask, earlier this week (Picture: Reuters)

Two British companies sold chemicals to Syria before the crisis began, it was revealed today.

Following last week’s outrage that export licenses had been approved by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) in 2012 – for which the government denied any actual handing over of chemicals – it has now come to light that firms did, however, sell chemicals for use in ‘cosmetics and healthcare products’ between 2004 and 2010.

Five licenses were given to two firms in July 2004, September 2005, March 2007, February 2009 and May 2010, in which sodium fluoride and potassium fluoride – believed by scientists to be key ingredients of poisonous gas, sarin – was sold to Syria.



As reported in the Mail on Sunday, a BIS spokeswoman said there is ‘no evidence that the chemicals were used in weapons programmes,’ and were instead believed to have been used for cosmetic purposes such as toothpaste.


However, there are now increasing concerns that the chemicals sold up until 2010 were stockpiled by Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and eventually used in alleged warfare against his own people.

Business secretary Vince Cable, while not in power when the chemicals were sold, may be asked to clarify why the government at that time approved the export licences (Picture: PA)

Further licenses were issued in early 2012 but according to officials no chemicals were sold and six months later, an EU sanction was put in place which forbade the sale of more chemicals to the region from any member country.

‘Previously we thought that while export licences had been granted, no chemicals were actually delivered. Now we know that in the build-up to the Syrian civil war, UK companies – with the backing of our Government – were supplying this potentially lethal substance,’ said Thomas Docherty MP and a member of the Commons Arms Export Controls Committee.

‘While the last export licence was issued in May 2010, these licences are obtained prior to manufacture and the industry standard is for four to five months to pass before the chemicals are delivered.

‘So we are looking at late 2010 for the British supplies of sodium fluoride reaching Syria. The Government has some very serious questions to answer.’

Syrian President Bashar Assad believes that the accusations that his troops used chemicals against civilians are ‘politically motivated’ (Picture: AP)

BIS has reportedly refused to outline exactly how much sodium and potassium fluoride was sold to Syria.

Sarin gas is widely believed by western governments to have been unfurled on Syrian civilians on August 21, killing 1,400 people.

The Syrian government, however, has blamed rebel forces for the chemical attack, as international tensions surrounding the bloody civil war escalate.

‘The Government’s approval of sodium fluoride sales to Syria during a period when it was widely suspected the regime was stockpiling dangerous substances is deeply disturbing,’ professor Alastair Hay, a toxicology expert told the Mail on Sunday.

‘This was a serious mistake on BIS’s part as while sodium fluoride has a multitude of benign uses, such as toothpaste, it remains a key ingredient in the manufacture of sarin. Quite simply, you need fluoride to make sarin.’