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Washington’s threats to attack Syria unacceptable – Russian Foreign Ministry
Washington’s statements threatening to use military force against Syria unilaterally are unacceptable, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said.
RT,
30 August, 2013
Given the lack of evidence, any unilateral military action bypassing the UN Security Council – “no matter how limited it is” – would be a direct violation of international law and would undermine the prospects for a political and diplomatic solution to the conflict in Syria and will lead to a new round of confrontation and victims, Lukashevich concludes.
Obama considers 'limited' military action against Syria
President
Barack Obama said Friday that he has not yet decided what action, if
any, will be taken by the United States military against the regime
of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad
30
August, 2013
Following
a Friday afternoon press conference in which Secretary of State John
Kerry said Pres. Assad’s regime used chemical gas last week to kill
more than 1,000 Syrian civilians, Obama said he has yet to decide how
the US will respond.
“The
world has an obligation to make sure that we maintain the law against
the use of chemical weapons,”
Obama said from the White House’s oval office. “I
have not made a final decision about the various actions that might
be taken to help us enforce that goal. But, as I already said, I have
had my military and our team look at a wide range of options.”
The
president added that his administration has consulted with US allies
and Congress, and that conversations have occurred “with
all of the interested parties.”
Obama
also echoed Kerry’s statement from earlier in the day when he
promised he wouldn’t put any “boots
on the ground”
should the US military be ordered to strike Assad’s army.
“In
no event are we considering any kind of military action that would
involve boots on the ground, that would involve a long term campaign,
but we are looking at the possibility of a limited, narrow act that
would help make sure that not only Syria but others around the world
understand that the international community cares about this chemical
weapons ban,”
Obama said.
Earlier
this week, the president said that the US intelligence community
would release a report justifying any action taken by the US against
Assad. The report, released Friday at the same time as Kerry’s
address, concluded that the US government “assesses
with high confidence that the Syrian government carried out a
chemical weapons attack in the Damascus suburbs on August 21, 2013.”
“Our
high confidence assessment is the strongest position that the US
intelligence community can take short of confirmation,”
the report reads in part. “We
will continue to seek additional information to close gaps in our
understanding of what took place.”
The
US currently has five warships deployed outside of Syria and has the
largest military on the planet at its disposal.
On
Thursday, Pres. Assad said “Syria
will defend itself against any aggression."
US
intel report stops short of confirming Assad is responsible for
chemical attack
United
States Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday that the US
intelligence
community has concluded that the regime of Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad is responsible for killing more than 1,000 people with
chemical gas last week near Damascus.
RT,
30
August, 2013
In
a statement released in tandem with Kerry’s remarks from the State
Department headquarters in Washington, DC Friday afternoon, the US
government says they assess “with high confidence” that the
government of Pres. Assad carried out a chemical weapons attack in
the Damascus suburbs on August 21, 2013.
According
to the remarks made by Sec. Kerry, the assault last week caused the
deaths of at least 1,429 Syrians, including no fewer than 426
children.
But
despite days of research and an international investigation, the US
says they cannot declare with 100 percent certainty at this time that
Assad’s regime was responsible.
“Our
high confidence assessment is the strongest position that the US
Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation,” the report
reads in part. “We will continue to seek additional information to
close gaps in our understanding of what took place.”
Nevertheless,
Kerry all but confirmed on Friday that Assad ordered the use of nerve
gas against civilians last week.
“[W]e
know that the Syrian regime’s elements were told to prepare for the
attack by putting on gas masks and taking precautions associated with
chemical weapons. We know that these were specific instructions. We
know where the rockets were launched from and at what time. We know
where they landed and when. We know rockets came only from
regime-controlled areas and went only to opposition controlled or
contested neighborhoods,” he said.
“We
have a body of information, including past Syrian practice, that
leads us to conclude that regime officials were witting of and
directed the attack on August 21,” the accompanying document
claims.
“To
conclude, there is a substantial body of information that implicates
the Syrian government’s responsibility in the chemical weapons
attack that took place on August 21.As indicated, there is additional
intelligence that remains classified because of sources and methods
concerns that is being provided to Congress and international
partners,” it says.
During
the Friday press conference, Kerry urged Americans and those in the
international community to read the declassified report that has been
published by the US government. One day earlier, he said US President
Barack Obama went over the intelligence with his national security
team, who then met with leaders of Congress and the lawmakers on the
congressional national security committees.
“Its
findings are as clear as they are compelling,” he said of the
report. “I'm not asking you to take my word for it. Read for
yourself, everyone, those listening, all of you, read for yourselves
the evidence from thousands of sources, evidence that is already
publicly available.”
Among
that evidence, Kerry said, is proof collected from thousands of
sources suggesting the Syrian government launched a gas attack last
week.
“With
our own eyes we have seen the thousands of reports from 11 separate
sites in the Damascus suburbs. All of them show and report victims
with breathing difficulties, people twitching with spasms, coughing,
rapid heartbeats, foaming at the mouth, unconsciousness and death.
And we know it was ordinary Syrian citizens who reported all of these
horrors,” Kerry said.
The
White House also released a map of Ghouta, displaying the areas
affected by the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack
“And
just as important,” he added, “we know what the doctors and the
nurses who treated them didn't report -- not a scratch, not a
shrapnel wound, not a cut, not a gunshot sound. We saw rows of dead
lined up in burial shrouds, the white linen unstained by a single
drop of blood.
“Instead
of being tucked safely in their beds at home, we saw rows of children
lying side by side, sprawled on a hospital floor, all of them dead
from Assad's gas and surrounded by parents and grandparents who had
suffered the same fate,” the secretary continued
In
addition to social media posts, videos taken after the attacks and
first-hand reports, Kerry said the US relied on signals intelligence
and geospatial intelligence to conclude Assad’s regime ordered the
attack.
Intelligence
offering a glimpse into Assad’s army, said Kerry, proved that
chemical weapons officials in charge of the nation’s arsenal of
warheads were making preparations days ahead of the attack.
According
to the report, US intelligence sources could not detect any
indication in the days before the assault that opposition affiliates,
as reported by some, were planning to use chemical weapons.
Some
signals intelligence intercepted, the report added, showed a senior
Assad regime official “intimately familiar with the offensive”
confirming the army used chemical weapons on Aug. 21, “and was
concerned with the UN inspectors obtaining evidence.”
According
to the report, the Syrian chemical weapons personnel were directed to
cease operations on the 21 and begin shelling the surrounding area
for five days,
The
document also rejects the allegation that video footage showing the
Aug. 21 assault was fabricated, and concludes that the Syrian
opposition lacks the capability to fake the assault, or the effects
of nerve gas.
Earlier
this week, senior US government officials said on condition of
anonymity to Associated Press reporters that the US lacked
significant evidence linking Assad to chemical weapon use. Multiple
officials, the AP reported Thursday morning, used the phrase “not a
slam dunk” to discuss the credibility of intelligence linking
chemical weapon use directly to Pres. Assad
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