Prospects for a political solution in Syria, which Obama has said is the only option for resolving the conflict, have worsened amid increasing violence.
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The meeting follows a string of policy decisions by the White House to expand USA military involvement against the Islamic State group.
Obama on Thursday, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon, made clear that both candidates would be treated equally.
Now, a fresh set of scandal has hit the Democratic Party and President Barrack Obama that the US government paid a ransom of $400 million to Iran to rescue detained Americans and released 7 Iranian detainees. “We didn’t here and we won’t in the future”.
“It wasn’t a secret”.
Italy, just across the Mediterranean Sea from Libya, has said it’s prepared to allow the U.S.to use its bases or airspace to launch strikes against IS in Libya. It was delivered to Iran on pallets aboard an unmarked plane. And he said: “We’re taking this extremely seriously”. “The reason that we had to give them cash is precisely because we are so strict in maintaining sanctions, and we do not have a banking relationship with Iran, that we couldn’t send them a check, and we could not wire the money”, he added. “We don’t have a banking relationship with Iran, which is part of the pressure we applied on them”.
On Thursday he admitted that Syria had been one of the most testing issues of his presidency, which will end in January.
Obama made the remarks in a news conference at the Pentagon after meeting with his national security team to discuss the fight against Islamic State.
“Those kinds of strategies can end up backfiring”, he said.
“In fact, they are inevitably going to be defeated”, the president said, predicting that the jihadist group would lose its self-proclaimed capital of Raqqa in Syria, in addition to their stronghold of Mosul in Iraq.
For almost two years, the US has been supporting local forces in Syria and neighboring Iraq as they work to push Islamic State terrorists out of their countries.
Trump has placed blame on Clinton and Obama for the rise of Islamic State, also known as ISIS. US procured the money from the central bank of Netherlands and Switzerland.
“What I will say is that they have been told these are classified briefings”, he added, in response to a question about whether he was concerned about Trump obtaining the classified information.
At a Pentagon news conference, Obama also criticized Russian Federation for its continuing support of Syrian government attacks against opposition forces and its sieges of populated areas like Aleppo.
“The US remains prepared to work with Russian Federation to try to reduce the violence and strengthen our efforts against ISIL and al-Qaeda in Syria”.
In response to a question later about whether Trump could be trusted with control of America’s nuclear weapons, Obama said, “I would ask all of you to make your own judgment”.
President Obama dismissed GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump’s comment this week that the election may be “rigged” this year. “The federal government doesn’t run the election process, it is states, and cities, and communities all across the country”.
“This is part of the reason, however, why it is so important for us to keep our eye on the ball and not panic, not succumb to fear because ISIL can’t defeat the United States of America or our North Atlantic Treaty Organisation partners”, Obama added. “If they want to be president, they have to start acting like a president”.
The meeting was followed by a press conference at the Pentagon, where he recounted the United States-led military campaign’s recent progress in recapturing territory from ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Though the number of IS fighters in Libya has dwindled, the U.S.is hoping to help Libya’s fledgling United Nations -backed unity government finish the job.
State Department totals show that 2,340 Syrian refugees arrived last month in the United States.
Two years ago, “to many observers, ISIL looked invincible”, he said. Total admissions for the current budget year now come to about 7,900, and the vast majority of them are Sunni Muslims, records show. “Thousands of documents, thumb drives [and] digital files which we will continue to use to keep destroying ISIL’s networks and stop foreign fighters”. He did not indicate how the U.S. intends to do more to prevent such small scale attacks, however.
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Rooting out small networks of terrorists or lone attackers in some ways “is tougher” than disrupting larger organisations, Mr Obama said.
