Member countries of the global chemical weapons monitoring group voted in the Hague Wednesday to give the organization expanded authority to assign blame for toxic weapons attacks.
Members of the Organization for the Prohibition for Chemical Weapons voted 82 to 24, easily exceeding the two-thirds majority need for approval.
The proposal was presented by Britain and was supported by the United States and the European Union. It was opposed, however, by 24 countries, including Russia, Syria and their allies.
"The U.K. has led the diplomatic efforts to secure this action," British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said in a statement. "We look forward to working with all countries who are members of the Chemical Weapons Convention to implement the decisions taken today, and we will continue to push back on any efforts to undermine the ban on these vile weapons."
A former Russian spy and his daughter were the victims of a nerve agent attack in the English city of Salisbury in March, for which Britain has blamed the Russian government. Moscow has denied any involvement.
Before the vote, the OPCW lacked the ability to say who was responsible for chemical attacks that had occurred in Syria and elsewhere; this now gives it the mandate to name those responsible.
In Syria, the U.N. Security Council had previously delegated attribution for chemical attacks to the Joint Investigative Mechanism, but it was not renewed last November after Russia used its veto to terminate it.
"The momentous decision to authorize the OPCW to attribute responsibility for chemical attacks in Syria and elsewhere in the world sends a powerful signal to victims of these illegal and indiscriminate weapons that those who deploy them can be unmasked and eventually prosecuted," said Louis Charbonneau, U.N. director at Human Rights Watch.
"The days of Russia using its Security Council veto to suppress the truth about chemical attacks in Syria are over," he added, saying the OPCW should quickly begin work on identifying the perpetrators of all confirmed chemical attacks in Syria.
