The Foreign Ministry has also demanded full and detailed explanation from Washington over the incident in Dier al-Zor, in which 62 Syrian troops were killed and over 100 injured. He said that in his decades as a diplomat he had “never seen such an extraordinary display of American heavy-handedness as we are witnessing today” and was “appalled” by Power’s remarks.
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Yet significant drama played out outside the meeting, as both Samantha Power, the USA ambassador to the United Nations, and Russian diplomat Vitaly Churkin delivered dueling statements to the press. Therefore, he said, there was no point in his listening to Power and he chose to leave the room to share his reflections with the media.
“It is not uncommon for the Coalition Air Operations Center to confer with Russian officials as a professional courtesy and to deconflict coalition and Russian aircraft, although such contact is not required by the current U.S. – Russia Memorandum of Understanding on safety of flight”, officials said in a statement.
The US is not known to have directly struck Syrian president Bashar Assad’s forces at any point during the five-year civil war. Yet Power also dismissed Russia’s request for this meeting as “a stunt replete with moralism and grandstanding”.
UNITED NATIONS The United States accused Russian Federation of grandstanding on Saturday by calling a U.N. Security Council meeting over USA -led coalition air strikes in Syria, as Russian Federation said the attacks killed dozens of Syrian soldiers and could endanger a truce deal between Moscow and Washington.
The attack, which had been targeting Islamic State militants, hit Syrian soldiers instead, according to the Russian military.
The official says the notification was sent through Russian Federation.
The U.S. Central Command statement was issued late Saturday, after Syria and Russian Federation said the U.S. -led coalition had struck a regime military base in Deir el-Zour that is surrounded by Daesh militants, enabling them to advance.
President Vladimir Putin said Moscow was keeping to its obligations under the truce, and the Syrian government was “fully abiding” by the agreement.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the death toll at 83 and said at least 120 soldiers were wounded.
In December, Damascus accused USA coalition warplanes of striking an army camp near Deir al-Zor, but Washington said it was done by Russian jets.
A US military official in Baghdad said he was looking into the report, which could not be independently corroborated. It denied a Syrian accusation in December previous year that it had attacked a government army camp in Deir Ezzor, according to the BBC.
Syria’s national TV also confirmed the killing of Syrian servicemen by the US -led coalition.
US Secretary of State John Kerry meanwhile called his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov and condemned “repeated and unacceptable delays of humanitarian aid”, spokesman John Kirby said.
Moscow said if the airstrikes were an error then it was a reflection of Washington’s refusal to coordinate with Russian Federation against terrorist groups in Syria.
Russian Federation has called an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, which is likely to meet in the coming hours.
ISIS militants launched an attack on the Syrian position after the airstrikes, Sputnik reported, citing the Russian Ministry of Defense.
Syria’s state news agency SANA says insurgents have violated the cease-fire 12 times in the last 12 hours.
General Viktor Poznikhir said the rebel groups had “not met a single obligation” of the truce.
The Syrian military said it viewed the strike as evidence the United States and the coalition support ISIS.
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The White House indicated Friday that the next phase of the deal would not move forward until the aid was moving freely.
