But both have accused the other of failing to adequately rein in forces under their influence on the ground – rebels, in the case of the United States, and the Syrian government, in Russia’s case.
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The UN Security Council discussed the fighting yesterday.
A top U.N. envoy is accusing Syria at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council of unleashing “unprecedented military violence” against civilians in Aleppo.
The US and Russia agreed on a ceasefire plan on September 12, but the truce looks increasingly shaky as the Russian ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin told the council on Sunday: “In Syria hundreds of armed groups are being armed, the territory of the country is being bombed indiscriminately and bringing a peace is nearly an impossible task now because of this”.
Appearing on BBC1’s The Andrew Marr Show, Mr Johnson said it was “the right question to ask” whether an air strike last week on a United Nations aid convoy – widely blamed on Russian warplanes – constituted a war crime. Russian Federation and China have protected Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government by blocking several attempts at council action.
At least seven people – six of them children – were killed in a barrel bombing of opposition-held eastern Aleppo Sunday, an activist group reported, as the Syrian government continues its furious offensive in the wake of a collapsed ceasefire.
Mohammad Zein Khandaqani, a member of the Medical Council, which oversees medical affairs in the opposition areas, says he expects numerous most badly wounded will die from insufficient treatment and facilities.
“A war crime is defined as when you attack something, attack a civilian target in the knowledge that it is a civilian target”, he said.
“Otherwise, Russia and Iran will become accomplices of the war crimes committed in Aleppo”, the minister said in a written statement with reference to the bombings that struck the Syrian city and killed scores of people. “They are guilty of making the war far more protracted and far more disgusting, and yes, when it comes up, the bombing of civilian targets, we should be looking.to see if the targeting is done in the knowledge they are wholly innocent civilian targets, [because] that is a war crime”, he said. All this is right except for two words: “Instead of “Russia” it needs to be “Great Britain” and instead of ‘Syria, ‘ ‘Iraq'”. “That is a war crime”.
France’s foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault also said that Russian Federation and Iran will be guilty of war crimes if they don’t pressure Syrian president Bashar al-Assad to stop the escalating violence.
UNITED NATIONS The United States on Sunday called Russia’s action in Syria “barbarism”, not counter-terrorism, while Moscow’s U.N. envoy said ending the war “is nearly an impossible task now” as Syrian government forces, backed by Moscow, bombed the city of Aleppo.
Russian Federation had deployed more military resources into the Syrian war than the United States, for whom the conflict was less of a strategic consideration, giving Russian Federation and its Syrian ally the upper hand on the battlefield, he said. I am calling on Russian Federation and Iran to pull themselves together and show resp.
“Instead of pursuing peace, Russian Federation and Assad make war”.
“It is time to say who is carrying out those air strikes and who is killing civilians”, Power said.
It comes after government forces launched their first major ground offensive to seize control of a strategic point on the northern outskirts of the city on Saturday night.
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“We retook the camp”, said Abu al-Hassanien, a rebel commander.
