An Associated Press reporter was outside the embassy when the first shell slammed into the compound in central Damascus and smoke billowed from inside.
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Before the shelling, the demonstrators had gathered outside the embassy carrying posters of the Russian and Syrian presidents, Vladimir Putin and Bashar Assad, and waved the two countries’ flags.
“We are counting on the perpetrators being found and that measures be taken to prevent such acts in the future”, Lavrov said, adding Moscow would investigate the incident along with Syrian authorities.
President Obama still welcomes “constructive” help from Russian Federation in the fight against the self-proclaimed Islamic State, but Moscow’s coordination with Damascus to strike anti-Assad forces is not Washington’s top concern in the region, Earnest said.
Syria’s Nusra Front, a branch of al Qaeda, described Russia’s involvement as a new Christian crusade from the east that was doomed to fail.
A spokesman for the Islamic State group, Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, vowed in an audio message that Russian Federation, like the US, will be defeated.
On Tuesday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova evoked the Kremlin’s reaction to the 9/11 attacks in comments rejecting the USA stance on Russia’s Syria campaign.
Kerry asserted that Russian Federation, like other countries around the world, understands that a military solution is not viable in Syria. The Iranian-backed Hezbollah group has also sent a fresh wave of fighters to Syria, he told AP.
Russia’s two-week-old air campaign has bolstered Assad and left the United States struggling to adjust its troubled military support programme for Assad’s opponents.
In the recording Adnani also warned other rebel groups fighting the Syrian regime against confronting IS.
The $500 million program was put on “pause” last week after high profile setbacks, including the defection of trained fighters as well as U.S.-provided arms to fighters falling into the hands of groups the US considers radical or terror organizations.
The deliveries are distinct from ammunition packages that a US-led coalition airdropped to Arab rebel groups in northeastern Syria late Sunday to bolster the fight against the extremist Islamic State group. The report did not elaborate.
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Another senior Revolutionary Guards commander, Hossein Hamedani, was killed last week while advising the Syrian army near Aleppo.
