The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- U.S. repositions naval forces, no decision on Syria strike
- Colombia peace talks suspended after FARC call for pause
- Guardian teams up with New York Times over Snowden documents
| U.S. repositions naval forces, no decision on Syria strike Posted: WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Friday was repositioning naval forces in the Mediterranean to give President Barack Obama the option for an armed strike on Syria, although officials cautioned that Obama had made no decision on military action. A defence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the U.S. Navy would expand its presence in the Mediterranean to four destroyers from three. Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel, en route to Asia, said Obama had asked the Pentagon for options on Syria, where an apparent chemical weapons attack that killed as many as 1,000 civilians has upped pressure on Washington to respond. "The Defence Department has responsibility to provide the president with options for all contingencies," Hagel said. "And that requires positioning our forces, positioning our assets, to be able to carry out different options - whatever options the president might choose." He did not elaborate. The defence official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said the USS Mahan, a destroyer armed with cruise missiles, had finished its deployment and was due to head back to its home base in Norfolk, Virginia. But the commander of the U.S. Sixth Fleet has decided to keep the ship in the region, the defence official said. The official stressed the Navy had received no orders to prepare for any military operations regarding Syria. Obama's senior national security advisers will convene at the White House this weekend to discuss U.S. options, including possible military action, against the Syrian government, another U.S. official said on Friday. A senior State Department official said no final decisions were expected from the meeting, pending a further review of intelligence on the attack. Secretary of State John Kerry planned to attend via videoconference. The meeting was expected to take place on Saturday. The U.S. president has been hesitant to intervene in Syria's 2 1/2-year-old civil war, sentiments he repeated earlier on Friday. But, in a development that could increase the pressure on Obama, American and European security sources said that U.S. and allied intelligence agencies had made a preliminary assessment that chemical weapons were used by Syrian forces in the attack near Damascus this week. SEEKING PROOF The security sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the assessment was preliminary and, at this stage, they were still seeking conclusive proof, which could take days, weeks or even longer to gather. Opponents of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad braved the front lines around Damascus to smuggle out tissue samples from victims of Wednesday's mass poisoning,. The Syrian government denies being responsible and has in the past accused rebels of using chemical weapons, an allegation that Western officials have dismissed. In his first public comments since Wednesday's attack in the Damascus suburbs, Obama called the incident a "big event of grave concern" and one that demanded U.S. attention, but said he was in no rush to get war-weary Americans "mired" in another Middle East conflict. Members of Obama's National Security Council, the Pentagon, State Department and intelligence agencies met at the White House late on Thursday, but made no decisions on what to recommend, officials said. One U.S. official acknowledged that the participants in Thursday's White House meeting aired "differing viewpoints," but rejected the notion that the administration, whose Syria policymaking has been marked by internal dissent in the past, was sharply divided on a response. "It's not like people were screaming at each other," the official said. International powers - including Russia, which has long shielded Assad from U.N. action - have urged Assad to cooperate with a U.N. inspection team that arrived on Sunday to pursue earlier allegations of chemical weapons attacks. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said there was "some evidence" of chemical weapons use in the latest incident, but stopped short of saying an official conclusion was reached. While the West accused Assad of a cover-up by preventing the U.N. team from visiting the scene, Moscow said the rebels were impeding an investigation. The United Nations released data showing that a million children were among refugees forced to flee Syria, calling it a "shameful milestone." CROSSING THE 'RED LINE' While the preliminary U.S. assessment was that Assad loyalists carried out Wednesday's attack with high-level authorization, one U.S. source closely monitoring events in the region said it was also possible that a local commander decided on his own to use gas to clear the way for a ground assault. "What we've seen indicates that this is clearly a big event, of grave concern," Obama said in an interview on CNN's "New Day" program that aired on Friday. Asked about his comment - made a year and a day before the toxic fumes hit sleeping residents of rebel-held Damascus suburbs - that chemical weapons would be a 'red line' for the United States, Obama expressed caution. "If the U.S. goes in and attacks another country without a U.N. mandate and without clear evidence that can be presented, then there are questions in terms of whether international law supports it," Obama said. "The notion that the U.S. can somehow solve what is a sectarian complex problem inside of Syria sometimes is overstated." Obama's caution contrasted with calls for action from NATO allies, including France, Britain and Turkey, where leaders saw little doubt Assad's forces had staged pre-dawn missile strikes that rebels say killed between 500 and well over 1,000 people. But two years into a civil war that has divided the Middle East along sectarian lines, a split between Western governments and Russia again illustrated the international deadlock that has thwarted outside efforts to halt the killing. At Thursday's White House meeting, which lasted more than three hours, Obama's aides had a "robust discussion" of the diplomatic and military options available to the president, U.S. officials said. Among the military options under consideration are targeted missile strikes on Syrian units believed responsible for chemical attacks or on Assad's air force and ballistic missile sites, U.S. officials said. Such strikes could be launched from U.S. ships or combat aircraft capable of firing missiles from outside Syrian airspace, thereby avoiding Syrian air defences. NO 'BOOTS ON THE GROUND' Kerry, who took part in Thursday's meeting by secure video link, advocated the use of air strikes in White House meetings in early June preceding an announcement of military aid to the rebels, a person familiar with the talks said. Joint Chiefs Chairman General Martin Dempsey argued that such a mission would be complex and costly. The White House on Friday reiterated Obama's position that he did not intend to put "boots on the ground" in Syria, and an administration official said Thursday's meeting also steered clear of the idea of enforcing a "no-fly" zone there. Another possibility would be to authorize sending heavier U.S. weaponry, such as shoulder-fired anti-aircraft rockets, to the rebels in addition to lighter arms approved in June. But even those limited supplies have yet to start flowing to the rebels. The top Democrat on the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee urged Obama on Friday to order air strikes against Assad's government. Representative Eliot Engel cited Obama's statement that the use of chemical weapons by Assad's forces would cross a "red line" and cause the United States to act to halt such violations of international law. "If we, in concert with our allies, do not respond to Assad's murderous uses of weapons of mass destruction, malevolent countries and bad actors around the world will see a green light where one was never intended," Engel wrote in a letter to Obama and obtained by Reuters. With Obama's international prestige seen on the line, a former senior U.S. official said the suspected chemical attack was likely to prompt Obama to use limited force, but he did not expect him to try to topple Assad. "They will feel obliged to do something because … the credibility issue is very high here," the former official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Obama's failure to confront Assad with the serious consequences he has long threatened would likely reinforce a global perception of a president preoccupied with domestic matters and unwilling to act decisively in the volatile Middle East, a picture already set by his mixed response to the crisis in Egypt. Obama has shown no appetite for intervention. Polls by Reuters/Ipsos and others have shown that most Americans, weary of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, are increasingly aware of the Syria conflict but remain opposed to U.S. involvement there. (Additional reporting by Erika Solomon in Beirut, Mark Hosenball, Arshad Mohammed, Roberta Rampton, Jeff Mason, Andrea Shalal-Esa, Patricia Zengerle, Phil Stewart and Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Warren Strobel and Peter Cooney) |
| Colombia peace talks suspended after FARC call for pause Posted: BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombia's government and Marxist FARC rebels suspended their participation in peace talks in Cuba on Friday, complicating nine months of painstaking negotiations aimed at ending five decades of bloodshed. President Juan Manuel Santos called his negotiating team home from Havana hours after the FARC, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, said it would "pause" the talks to review a government plan to put any peace deal to a popular vote. It was the first interruption to the talks that began last November and a sudden dent to hopes the two sides would soon see the difficult talks through to the end, after recent comments from the FARC had given cause for optimism. While the halt to talks will worry Colombians, analysts said there is little reason to suspect the two sides will not resume talks again. Santos, who bet his political legacy on bringing peace to the Andean nation, sent a bill on Thursday to Congress that calls for a referendum on any peace accord during national elections in either March or May next year. "The FARC has decided to pause the discussions at the table, to focus exclusively on analyzing the implications of the government's proposal," Pablo Catatumbo, one of the lead FARC negotiators, said in a statement. Santos said discussions would only resume when the government considered it appropriate. "We are going to assess their statement, their behaviour toward the government initiative (which aims) to accelerate the solution of the conflict," Santos said in a brief statement at Bogota's military airport. "In this process, the one who makes pauses and establishes the conditions, is not the FARC." The FARC has said repeatedly it sees a constituent assembly as the best way to enshrine the tenets of the peace accords in the country's constitution and does not trust that a referendum would protect agreements reached in Havana. Colombians are desperate to see an end to the war that has killed more than 200,000 people and displaced millions since it began in 1964. Santos is also eager to negotiate peace with the National Liberation Army, a smaller rebel group known as the ELN. He has said he wants the FARC peace accord by November. LIMITED PATIENCE In the final year of his four-year term, Santos has ruled out a constituent assembly and said the Colombian people must support any deals reached before an end to the war can be declared. Santos has not said if he will seek re-election. He accepted the FARC's right to study the government proposal, but urged the rebel negotiators not to take too long. "The FARC has left the negotiating table to study the proposal and it's legitimate and valid that it should, but time is passing and the patience of the Colombian people has a limit," Santos said earlier on Friday. Some analysts say the unilateral decision by the government to seek a referendum goes against the spirit of the initial agreement that led to talks, in which it was clear both sides would decide jointly how to ratify any deal. "This incident weakens the peace process," said Carlos Lozano, political analyst and editor of the left-leaning weekly magazine Voz. "But it is not at risk because it is just an incident and can be overcome." The FARC has battled a dozen governments since it began as an agrarian struggle against rural inequality. Even while it has been severely weakened in the past 10 years by a heavy U.S.-backed offensive, it remains a formidable threat to the government and civilian population. More than three dozen FARC commanders are in Havana working through a five-point agenda involving agrarian reform, reparation to victims, stemming the illegal drug trade, an end to the conflict and the FARC's inclusion in the political system. The disruption in talks comes on the heels of several comments from the FARC in recent days that appeared to show irritation with comments from Santos, but the group also recently expressed optimism that progress had been made. In a recent interview, Santos told Reuters the rebel leadership could face jail terms if peace were achieved. He also said FARC negotiators would need to return to Colombia's jungle and face capture or death in battle if talks collapse. (Additional reporting by Nelson Acosta and Marc Frank in Havana and Monica Garcia and Fernando Peinado in Bogota; Editing by Peter Cooney and Ken Wills) |
| Guardian teams up with New York Times over Snowden documents Posted: WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Guardian has agreed with the New York Times to give the U.S. newspaper access to some classified documents leaked by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, both papers said on Friday. In a brief story posted on its website, the Guardian said it "struck a partnership" with the Times after the British government threatened the Guardian with legal action unless it either surrendered or destroyed files it received from Snowden about Government Communications Headquarters - Britain's equivalent of NSA. "In a climate of intense pressure from the UK government, the Guardian decided to bring in a US partner to work on the GCHQ documents provided by Edward Snowden. We are working in partnership with the NYT and others to continue reporting these stories," the British newspaper said in a statement. The Times' executive editor, Jill Abramson, confirmed the collaboration. "We don't usually comment on our reporting before publication, but in this case we will make an exception since it is already public. The Times is reporting on material from The Guardian as well as other matters related to Edward Snowden," the Times quoted her as saying. A source familiar with the matter said the partnership deal had been struck several weeks ago and that Abramson was personally involved in negotiating it. The website Buzzfeed reported that Scott Shane, a Times reporter who covers national security and intelligence, was working on a series of stories expected to be published next month jointly with the Guardian. The Guardian said in its story that its partnership with the Times would enable it to "continue exposing mass surveillance by putting the Snowden documents on GCHQ beyond government reach." It said Snowden, who disclosed documents on U.S. internet and phone surveillance programs in June and has obtained asylum in Russia, was aware of the deal. The Guardian's editor, Alan Rusbridger, revealed earlier this week that under the supervision of representatives of GCHQ, Guardian staffers had destroyed computer equipment containing Snowden files after the newspaper was threatened with possible legal action by senior British government officials. Rusbridger said he had put British officials on notice that copies of material which had been destroyed had been sent outside British government jurisdiction. British authorities say they launched a criminal investigation this week following the temporary detention and questioning at London's Heathrow Airport of David Miranda, domestic partner of Glenn Greenwald, a Brazil-based Guardian writer who has led coverage of leaks from Snowden and communicated directly with the former NSA contractor. British officials have said that Snowden's leaks have gravely damaged national security and could put lives in jeopardy if more secrets are disclosed. The Times and the Guardian previously collaborated on stories related to alleged phone hacking by British tabloid newspapers and on coverage of secret U.S. military and diplomatic documents made available by U.S. Army soldier Bradley Manning to the WikiLeaks website. (Reporting By Mark Hosenball; Editing by Mohammad Zargham) |
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