A top Syrian government official attended a conference in Paris on Tuesday at the invitation of French parliamentarians, days after he was banned from a similar meeting in Brussels, prompting an angry reaction from the French government, reports FRANCE 24.
French foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault tweeted that he was "outraged" at an invitation by Members of Parliament (MPs) from the conservative Les Républicains party to Syrian deputy foreign minister Ayman Soussan to take part in a meeting on the conflict at the Russian cultural centre in Paris.
European Parliament head Antonio Tajani had banned Soussan from a Brussels conference planned for April 10th in response to the suspected chemical attack on a Syrian rebel-held town that killed at least 87 people last week.
Ayrault expressed his anger at an invitation to Paris being extended to Soussan "after the despicable chemical attack", which the US and Western allies have blamed on the Syrian regime.
Conservative MP Thierry Mariani told AFP that the event - called "Syria, A Tragedy That Cannot Go On" - had been organised before the attack, in collaboration with two socialist MPs.
"The conference had been planned for two months [to be held] in a room at the assembly," Mariani told AFP.
"But after the cancellation last week of a meeting in Brussels with the deputy minister, I felt like there was a risk of the conference being cancelled."
The event was subsequently moved to the Russian cultural centre, he said.