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U.S. Launches Military Strikes Against Syria
Topic Started: Apr 6 2017, 09:41 PM (209 Views)
Webster
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.....reports coming in of U.S. military strikes against Syrian targets over the past hour in response to Tuesday's horrific gas attack in northern Syria.....


(The Guardian) News is breaking that the US has launched missile strikes against Syria.

NBC News reports that strikes were launched on al-Shayrat airfield, a Syrian military site close to Homs.

Reports from NBC and CNN say more than 50 Tomahawk missiles were fired.

This follows an apparent change of heart by Donald Trump over action in Syria, sparked by Tuesday’s chemical weapons attack in Idlib that killed more than 70 people.

We will be following developments here on the live blog as they unfold.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Syria rebels welcome US strike
--Syrian rebels on Friday welcomed a US strike on a government airbase and called for additional action, with one powerful faction saying a single strike was not enough, AFP reports.

“Hitting one airbase is not enough, there are 26 airbases that target civilians,” a key figure in the Army of Islam faction, Mohamed Alloush, said on Twitter. “The whole world should save the Syrian people from the clutches of the killer Bashar [al-Assad] and his aides.”

Other rebel groups welcomed the US strike and called for continued military action against the regime.

“The American strike against the killing tools used by Bashar al-Assad is the first step on the correct path to combating terrorism and we hope it will continue,” said Issam Raes, spokesman for the Southern Front rebel faction. “In my opinion, the message is political, and the message has arrived to Russia and been understood.”

Colonel Ahmed Osman, of the Turkey-backed Sultan Murad rebel group, said: “We welcome any action that will put an end to the regime that is committing the worst crimes in history.”

Mohamed Bayrakdar, another leader of the Army of Islam, which operates mainly around the capital Damascus, described the strike as “a bold and correct step”.

“We welcome any response to the crimes of the regime,” he told AFP.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) China’s Global Times, a nationalist Communist party-controlled tabloid that sometimes reflects official views, has published an online editorial criticising Trump’s strikes against Syria.

The newspaper said the attack was likely to spark conflict between the US and Russia and “took place despite no definitive results from the investigation by an international organisation, and was carried out in the absence of a UN security council resolution”.

“Trump’s decision to attack the Assad government is a show of force from the US president,” it added. “He wants to prove that he dares to do what Obama dared not. He wants to prove to the world that he is no ‘businessman president’ and that he will use US military force without hesitation when he considers it necessary.”

“This is Trump’s first major move in international affairs, and it leaves an impression that the decision was made in haste,” the newspaper added. “The Syrian civil war is entering a new phase. More refugees will flee the region and Europe may have to pay the price.”
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, said he supported Donald Trump’s “resolve” against the use and proliferation of chemical weapons.

“We understand that the action taken by the United States was designed to prevent the situation [in Syria] from worsening,” Kyodo News quoted Abe as saying after a meeting of Japan’s national security council.

Abe described Tuesday’s chemical weapons attack on Syrian civilians as “extremely inhumane”, adding that he appreciated Trump’s attempts to address threats to global security, including North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes.

Syria aside, Abe said “the threat from weapons of mass destruction is also growing more serious in east Asia”.

He added: “Japan will coordinate with the United States and the rest of the international community and play its proper role in global peace and stability.”

Angelino Alfano, the Italian foreign minister, said in a statement that Italy understood the reasons behind US military action and called the strikes a “proportionate” deterrent to the further use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime.

Alfano called for a “necessary and urgent” meeting of the UN security council – where Italy, a non-permanent member, currently has a vote – and the adoption of a consensus resolution to prevent further atrocities.

He also pointed to Rex Tillerson’s upcoming visit to Moscow, suggesting that the US secretary of state could encourage Russia to use its influence in Syria and with Assad to agree “a real ceasefire, full humanitarian access and a gradual building of trust between the Syrian parties”.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Hillary Clinton had called for the US to take out Syrian government-controlled airfields just hours before Donald Trump launched airstrikes against Bashar al-Assad’s regime, PA reports.

Speaking in her first public interview since losing the US election in November, Clinton said Assad’s aerial power had been the key component behind widespread civilian deaths since the start of the civil war in 2011.

President Trump authorised the launchof cruise missiles in the early hours of Friday morning on a Syrian airbase thought to be behind this week’s chemical weapons attack.

Speaking to the New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, Clinton said she believed the US had been wrong not to have previously launched such an offensive.

She said: “Assad had an air force, and that air force is the cause of most of the civilian deaths, as we have seen over the years and as we saw again in the last few days.

“And I really believe that we should have and still should take out his airfields and prevent him from being able to use them to bomb innocent people and drop Sarin gas on them.”
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Iran, Assad’s staunch regional backer, was quick to condemn the US strike on Syria’s Shayrat airbase, saying it violated international law and risked complicating the conflict further.

Tehran authorities also questioned claims that Assad was behind the chemical attack on Khan Sheikhun.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran, as the biggest victim of chemical weapons in the contemporary history, condemns all uses of chemical weapons regardless of their users or victims, and at the same time considers any unilateral measure with this excuse as dangerous, destructive, and violating of the imperative principles of the international law,” said Bahram Ghasemi, Tehran’s foreign ministry spokesman, according to the semi-official Mehr news agency.

“We believe that the American missile attack on Shayrat airbase in Syria launched from US warships, with the excuse of the mysterious chemical attack on Khan Sheikhun, Idlib, whose time, executers and beneficiaries are shrouded in mystery, strengthens the near-to-death terrorists and complicates the situation in Syria and the whole region,” he added.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) A Russian defence ministry statement read on state television said the US attack had been “ineffective” and claimed Syrian authorities were looking for 36 Tomahawk missiles which fell outside the base and missed the target.

The statement also confirmed that Russia would stop cooperation and communication with US forces in Syria.

The Russian state news reporter Evgeny Poddubny is at the base and posted a video of the damage on his Instagram account. He also wrote that his “preliminary information” at the base was that nine jets were destroyed in the strike.

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, will hold a meeting of his security council later on Friday to discuss the US missile strikes on Syria, the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters.

Russia has suspended its Syria air safety agreement with the United States following the missile strikes, Reuters reports.

Peskov said Russia would keep technical and military channels of communication open with Washington but would not exchange any information through them.

“In light of the missile strikes, risks [of collisions between Russian and US aircraft] are significantly higher,” the spokesman told reporters.

The strikes were carried out in the interests of Islamic State and other radical groups operating in Syria, Peskov added.
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(The Guardian) A warplane on Friday bombed the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhun, where a chemical attack killed scores of people earlier this week and prompted US missile strikes, a witness in the rebel-held area and a war monitoring group has said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based organisation that monitors the war, said a Syrian government or Russian warplane hit Khan Sheikhun, in rebel-held Idlib province, before noon local time.

The Syrian army and the Russian defence ministry could not immediately be reached for comment.

The witness, an activist working with an air raid warning service in opposition areas, said the jet struck at about 11am (0800 GMT) at the northern edge of the town, causing damage but no known casualties.

The US fired dozens of cruise missiles on Friday at an airfield from which it said the Khan Sheikhun chemical attack that killed at least 70 people had been launched on Tuesday.

Washington blamed the gas attack on Syrian government forces. The Syrian government strongly denies responsibility and said it had not used chemical weapons.

The observatory and the witness said earlier this week that the aircraft which they accused of carrying out the suspected gas attack had flown out of Shayrat airbase.

The Syrian army said the missile attack on its airbase killed six people and caused extensive damage, describing it as a “blatant aggression”.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) The UK’s foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, appears to be taking a wait-and-see approach to the US president’s decision to launch the airstrike.

Emerging from talks with the Greek prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, on Friday morning, Johnson avoided making any comment, with one aide telling reporters he was “departing immediately” for Britain.

Johnson had preferred to stick to the issues of Brexit, Cyprus and Turkey during his discussions with the Greek leader, officials in Athens told the Guardian.

A spokeswoman for Number 10 and the UK defence secretary, Michael Fallon, have said they supported the strikes, adding they were “appropriate”.
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(The Guardian) The European commission head, Jean Claude Juncker, responded that “he understands efforts to deter future attacks” and that the EU stood ready to play its role in finding a political solution to the crisis.

A statement for the European commission president said: A horrific chemical weapons attack on civilians struck Khan Sheikhun on 4 April. Last night, in response, the US launched airstrikes on Shayrat airfield. The US has informed the EU that these strikes were limited and seek to deter further chemical weapons atrocities.

President Juncker has been unequivocal in his condemnation of the use of chemical weapons.

The repeated use of such weapons must be answered. He understands efforts to deter further attacks. There is a clear distinction between airstrikes on military targets and the use of chemical weapons against civilians.

Efforts to stem the spiral of violence in Syria and work towards a lasting peace should be redoubled. Only a political transition can lead to such an outcome. President Juncker and the European commission as a whole stand ready to play their part in full.
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(The Guardian) US missile attack risks escalation in Syria - Corbyn
--Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour party, has broken his silence over the US missile strikes in Syria. He said:

The US missile attack on a Syrian government airbase risks escalating the war in Syria still further.

Tuesday’s horrific chemical attack was a war crime which requires urgent independent UN investigation and those responsible must be held to account. But unilateral military action without legal authorisation or independent verification risks intensifying a multi-sided conflict that has already killed hundreds of thousands of people.

What is needed instead is to urgently reconvene the Geneva peace talks and unrelenting international pressure for a negotiated settlement of the conflict.

The terrible suffering of the Syrian people must be brought to an end as soon as possible and every intervention must be judged on what contribution it makes to that outcome.

The British government should urge restraint on the Trump administration and throw its weight behind peace negotiations and a comprehensive political settlement.
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(The Guardian) The Nato secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, has said the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, “bears full responsibility” for the US airstrikes against an airbase in Syria, Reuters reports.

Stoltenberg added: “Any use of chemical weapons is unacceptable, cannot go unanswered, and those responsible must be held accountable.” Stoltenberg was told by the US defense secretary that the airstrikes would go ahead.

The UN coordinator for humanitarian affairs says it has no sign that US military strikes against a Syrian airbase have had “any direct consequence” on overall aid operations in Syria, AP reports.

Jens Laerke, of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said such violence “is not a new feature” of Syria’s war, and cited continued UN-led efforts to reach people in besieged and hard-to-reach areas of the country.

The US launched cruise missile strikes against Shayrat airbase in Homs province following a chemical attack in a northern village that US officials and others have blamed on Assad forces.

Ravina Shamdasani, a UN human rights office spokeswoman, said on Friday at a UN briefing that use of chemical weapons, if confirmed, would amount to a war crime.
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(The Guardian) Russian military to strengthen Syrian air defences – AP
--The Russian military has said it would help Syria strengthen its air defences after the US strike on a Syrian airbase, AP reports. A Russian defence ministry spokesman, Maj Gen Igor Konashenkov, said that a “complex of measures” to strengthen Syrian air defences would be done shortly to help “protect the most sensitive Syrian infrastructure facilities”.

Konashenkov said “the combat efficiency of the US strike was very low”, adding that only 23 of the 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles had reached Shayrat airbase in the province of Homs.

He said the attack had destroyed six MiG-23 fighter jets of the Syrian air force which were under repairs but didn’t damage other Syrian warplanes at the base. Konashenkov added that the base’s runway also had been left undamaged.
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(The Guardian) Putin Holds Security Council Meeting
--Vladimir Putin has held a meeting of the security council to discuss the Russian response. “The participants expressed deep concern at the inevitable negative consequences of these aggressive actions for the joint efforts to fight terrorism,” said spokesman Dmitry Peskov. He said the security council also expressed regret at the harm the strike would do to US-Russian relations, and they discussed ways to continue the Russian air force operation in Syria to give support to Assad’s army.
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(The Guardian) The leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron, has backed the US airstrikes in Syria in a piece for the Guardian.

It starts: I am in no doubt that what will end the war in Syria is what ultimately ends every conflict: words and diplomacy, not weapons. But when diplomacy fails and civilians suffer, as they have been doing for many years in Syria, and when they are the victim of weapons that have been outlawed by the international community for their horrific and indiscriminate consequences, then we cannot shy away from proportionate military intervention.
-Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/07/donald-trump-syria-strike-tim-farron-assad-chemical-weapons-theresa-may
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(The Guardian) There has been more support for Trump’s airstrikes in Syria, this time from Canada and Jordan.

The Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, said in a statement: “Canada fully supports the United States’ limited and focused action to degrade the Assad regime’s ability to launch chemical weapons attacks against innocent civilians, including many children.

“President Assad’s use of chemical weapons and the crimes the Syrian regime has committed against its own people cannot be ignored.”

The Jordanian state news agency, Petra, reported that the Jordanian administration said the US missile strike was “necessary and appropriate”.
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