WASHINGTON, June 14 (UPI) — Britain shares the United States’ “candid assessment” that Syrian leader Bashar Assad used chemical weapons against rebels, Prime Minister David Cameron said.
Cameron praised the United States for redirecting focus back to the “difficult question” about how to confront Assad, Britain’s Guardian reported Friday.
The Wall Street Journal reported officials saying the White House’s green light to arm rebels fighting the Assad regime may also include a limited no-fly zone.
Such a move, if approved by President Obama, would significantly expand U.S. support and involvement in the 27-month civil war the United Nations said Thursday has killed more than 90,000 people.
Cameron told The Guardian, “I welcome this candid assessment by the Americans I think it, rightly, puts back [on] center stage the question, the very difficult question to answer but nonetheless one we have got to address: What are we going to do about the fact that in our world today there is a dictatorial and brutal leader who is using chemical weapons under our noses against his own people.”
Cameron said British and U.S. intelligence agencies have been sharing information.
U.S. intelligence officials believe Syrian regime troops killed 100 to 150 rebels with sarin gas, a potent nerve agent classified by the United Nations as a weapon of mass destruction, White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters Thursday.
In Moscow, a government spokesman said Russia wasn’t convinced by a U.S. report about chemical weapons use by Syrian forces against the rebels, RIA Novosti reported Friday.
“The Americans have tried to provide us with information on the use by the [Assad] regime of chemical weapons, but I will be frank: The report does not seem convincing to us,” Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov said.
Russia, a key trading partner with Syria, has blocked U.N. efforts to sanction the Assad regime since the civil war began.
Alexei Pushkov, head of Russia’s parliamentary foreign affairs committee, dismissed the U.S. report as “a fabrication,” ITAR-Tass reported.
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said he welcomed the “clear U.S. statement” and urged the Syrian regime to grant access to U.N. inspectors to investigate reports of chemical weapons use in the country.
U.S. officials told the Journal a limited no-fly zone was being considered but Rhodes said the administration had “not made any decision to pursue a military operation such as a no-fly zone,” citing, among other things, the difficulty in implementing it, the expense and no “clear guarantee” it would improve the situation.
Rhodes also said the administration ruled out deploying U.S. ground troops.
The no-fly zone — which an official quoted by the Journal dubbed a “no-fighting zone” — would be enforced by U.S. and allied planes in Jordanian territory to protect rebel fighters who would train there, as well as Syrian refugees.
Jordan, a key U.S. ally overwhelmed by refugees from Syria, has offered Washington use of its bases to help establish a safe zone along the Syrian border.
The zone would extend as many as 25 miles into Syria from Jordan, the Journal said.
Washington and allies would enforce the zone using aircraft flown from Jordanian bases, the U.S. officials told the Journal.
The aircraft would generally fly inside Jordan, but any incursion into Syrian air space, if threatened by advancing Syrian planes, could be justified as self-defense, the officials said.
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