If the US attacks Syria, as it did in April after a reported chemical weapons attack, the Syrian reaction will not be the same as before, Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad said on Monday.
Addressing journalists in Damascus, Mekdad said he would not be surprised if the US attacked Syria again, but Syria and its allies would react differently to "a new aggression." He added that Syria no longer had chemical weapons.
The Syrian government on Saturday dismissed a report by the international chemical weapons watchdog that said the banned nerve agent sarin was used in the April attack in northern Syria, saying it lacked "any credibility."
Western governments including the United States have said the Syrian government carried out the attack in the town of Khan Sheikhoun which killed dozens of people. The Syrian government has denied using chemical weapons.
The attack prompted a US missile strike against a Syrian air base which Washington said was used to launch the strike. The report into the attack was circulated to members of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague, but was not made public.
A Syrian rebel group accused the Syrian army of using chlorine gas against its fighters on Saturday in battles east of Damascus - an accusation the military swiftly denied as a fabrication.
