Russian Federation first launched air strikes on Syria in September at the request of its long-standing ally President Bashar al-Assad, while a US-led coalition of countries opposed to the Syrian strongman is conducting a separate air campaign against IS.
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The militants are suspected of carrying out large-scale terror attacks in Paris, Beirut and the bombing of a Russian airliner, killing hundreds of civilians.
Also, he pointed out that “only the Syrians can choose someone they trust”.
Sensing the edgy new rapprochement between Washington and Moscow, Hollande said Wednesday that he would travel to Washington next week to meet with Obama. “Our Western partners have put some formats on ice”, he said, referring to venues such as the NATO-Russia Council.
IS claimed responsibility for the attack but Russians would not say whether they think the IS was behind it. He was using an alternative acronym for the extremist group. Lavrov reiterated Russia’s traditional stance that Assad protected the interests of “a significant part of Syrian society” therefore it would not be possible to reach a settlement “without his participation”.
Blair’s “confession is the most important evidence”, Assad added. Such a step would solidify an emerging global coalition and help clear the way for a more concerted military effort to counter Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.
“We must be implacable against all forms of violence”. ISIS, he said, “probably will” attack again as it did in Paris. “Roosevelt didn’t like Stalin, but he had to get a deal with him in order to defeat the Nazis, who were the greater evil”, Garcia-Margallo said.
Russia, he says, has so badly mangled its intervention in Syria that it may have little choice but to favor settling the conflict.
“This barbaric terrorist organization must be destroyed and it’s right that we offer all the support we can to confront them”, U.K. Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said in the statement.
Still, to broaden France’s diplomatic support, Hollande invoked an unusual article in the Lisbon Treaty that governs the European Union.
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One Russian official said there was consensus at last weekend’s G-20 summit in Turkey on the need to target Islamic State, though no breakthrough with the USA yet. He’s held back from asking Parliament to vote on the issue for lack of cross-party support.
