“I provided examples based on our data on the financing of different Islamic State units by private individuals”.
Advertisement
Islamic State has claimed responsibility for bombings and shootings in Paris last Friday in which a few 129 people were killed.
Russia this week launched massive strikes on Raqqa in response to confirmation that the group had blown up a plane full of Russian tourists over Sinai in Egypt. “Do they actually believe that they can prop up Assad and win on the ground militarily inside Syria against all the opposition, or do they actually think that it is better to save the Syrian state and work with the global community and the United Nations to find a government that truly can be legitimate”.
But beneath the surface, major rifts remain.
“We do not have to lose out values in terms of our ability to vet people”, Kerry said in criticizing lawmakers who hours earlier voted overwhelmingly in support of a House bill that tightens an already stringent vetting process for Syrian and Iraqi refugees wishing to enter the U.S. “The Russians and Iranians are more convinced now that Assad is the only hope for Syria… But they talk the talk of being part of the solution and they walk the walk of being part of the problem”. But in a television interview with Italy’s Rai television, Assad said there could be no transition schedule for elections while swathes of Syria remained out of government control. Others said it was Washington that pushed a reluctant Riyadh to attend. “But there’s little, if anything, that’s been agreed on Syria”.
Putin has long backed Assad, while the United States wants to see the Syrian dictator deposed.
Given the great difference in, among other things, the approach to civilian casualties, “I wouldn’t cooperate with Russian Federation militarily”, says retired Col. Peter Mansoor, professor of military history at Ohio State University in Columbus.
Just months ago, Paris and Moscow faced off over the sale of two Mistral warships, which France refused to deliver to Russian Federation over Moscow’s backing of separatists in eastern Ukraine – a charge Russian Federation has always denied.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday the West had to drop its demands about the political exit of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if it wanted a genuinely global coalition against ISIS.
Saturday’s announcement from Vienna said the five permanent Security Council members would support a Syria ceasefire resolution.
Advertisement
“The French strikes against oil sites controlled by Daesh (Islamic State) are part of legitimate self-defense”, French Foreign Ministry spokesman Romain Nadal told reporters on Friday.
