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West Faces Challenge in Moving Syrian Chemical Arms Through Battlefields

WASHINGTON — A plan announced over the weekend for getting the bulk of Syria ’s chemical weapons out of the country in coming weeks has raised major concerns in Washington, because it involves transporting the weapons over roads that are battlegrounds in the country’s civil war and loading them onto a ship that has no place to go. Security for the shipments is being provided entirely by Syrian military units loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, who has surprised American officials with how speedily he has complied with an agreement brokered by Russia to identify and turn over his chemical weapon stockpiles. Intelligence analysts and Pentagon officials say the shipments will be vulnerable to attack as they travel past the ruins of a war that has raged for two and a half years. Asked over the weekend what the backup plan would be if the chemical weapons components were attacked […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Bomb at Base Kills at Least 31 Syrian Troops

BEIRUT, Lebanon — At least 31 Syrian troops, including four senior officers, were killed on Sunday in a bombing that collapsed a building on a government military base just north of Damascus, the Syrian capital, an antigovernment monitoring group said. It was one of the deadliest attacks on government soldiers in recent months. The deaths came as a government offensive against rebels continued on three fronts: in the outskirts of Damascus, in the south; outside Aleppo, in the north; and in the Qalamoun mountain region bordering Lebanon, in western Syria. The explosion, at the army’s transport base in the contested suburb of Harasta, appeared to have been set off by a device placed inside the building or in a tunnel, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights , a Britain-based group that tracks the violence in Syria. The blast caused the building to collapse, the group said. There […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Hezbollah Chief Says His Forces Will Stay in Syria

LONDON — The head of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militant group whose armed followers are fighting in Syria on the side of President Bashar al-Assad, pledged on Thursday that his forces would remain there as long as necessary. The leader, Hassan Nasrallah, spoke at a Shiite ceremony in his stronghold in southern Beirut, the Lebanese capital, held to observe Ashura, one of the most important holidays on the Shiite religious calendar. It commemorates the killing of Imam Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. Mr. Nasrallah’s battle-hardened fighters joined the fray in Syria earlier this year to recapture a border town, and Mr. Assad’s foes say they have also been deployed on other fronts in the south near Damascus, the capital, and Aleppo in the north. “As long as the reasons remain, our presence there will remain,” Mr. Nasrallah told thousands of his followers. “Our fighters, our mujahedeen, are […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Insight: As powers push for talks, Syria balance tilts towards Assad

BEIRUT (Reuters) – More than two and a half years into the civil war devastating Syria, the United States and Russia are pushing the combatants to the negotiating table in Geneva, but on terms that mark a shift in favor of Bashar al-Assad against the increasingly fragmented rebels seeking to oust him. Since the August 21 nerve gas attacks on rebel suburbs ringing Damascus, which brought the U.S. to the brink of a missile assault on Assad’s forces, the diplomatic tide has turned against the opposition, which briefly believed external intervention would enable its forces to launch a final offensive. Instead, the combination of hesitation by President Barack Obama’s administration and an 11th hour deal brokered by Russia, a key Assad ally, to decommission Syria’s chemical arsenal, has wrong-footed the rebels, now under intense U.S. and European pressure to attend talks in Geneva with a vague agenda. Syrian opposition […]

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Exclusive: Assad allies profit from Syria's lucrative food trade

LONDON (Reuters) – As food begins to flow into Bashar al-Assad’s Syria after several months of disruption, some of the president’s close allies stand to make substantial profits from the secretive trade, according to trade and opposition sources with knowledge of the situation. While civil war grinds on, Syria is facing its worst wheat harvest in three decades and Assad has been scrambling to bolster depleted food supplies. Using front companies and shipping lines, a discreet commercial and logistical network is now emerging, which aims not only to procure food commodities but to generate big returns for members of Assad’s inner circle, trade sources familiar with the matter say. The sources declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the trade in time of war. Rami Makhlouf, Assad’s cousin and top financial ally, together with Ayman Jaber, another prominent figure subject to international sanctions, are among those involved […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Exclusive: Assad allies profit from Syria’s lucrative food trade

LONDON (Reuters) – As food begins to flow into Bashar al-Assad’s Syria after several months of disruption, some of the president’s close allies stand to make substantial profits from the secretive trade, according to trade and opposition sources with knowledge of the situation. While civil war grinds on, Syria is facing its worst wheat harvest in three decades and Assad has been scrambling to bolster depleted food supplies. Using front companies and shipping lines, a discreet commercial and logistical network is now emerging, which aims not only to procure food commodities but to generate big returns for members of Assad’s inner circle, trade sources familiar with the matter say. The sources declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the trade in time of war. Rami Makhlouf, Assad’s cousin and top financial ally, together with Ayman Jaber, another prominent figure subject to international sanctions, are among those involved […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Syrian Forces Recapture Damascus Suburb From Rebels

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Syrian government forces recaptured a suburb south of Damascus on Wednesday and continued battles to push insurgents out of long-held territory outside the northern city of Aleppo, in what appeared to be a major push to gain ground ahead of proposed internationally sponsored peace talks. State news media showed government troops entering Hujeira, the latest in a string of suburbs south of Damascus where the government has made inroads in recent days, trying to sever supply lines between rebel-held towns that form an arc around the capital. Despite rebel claims to be tightening a noose around the seat of power, and government claims that the army would soon push rebels out of the suburbs, the front lines around the capital have changed little over the past year, with rebel and government forces dug in within a few hundred yards of each other in many places. The […]

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Insight: Russia fears return of fighters waging jihad in Syria

NOVOSASITLI, Russia (Reuters) – A scrawny 15-year-old this summer became the first from his deeply religious Muslim village in Russia’s southern Dagestan province to die fighting alongside rebels in Syria. Some regard him as a martyr for joining the rebels in the fight against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad who is supported by Russia. Moscow now fears that hundreds of Russian-born militants it says are fighting in Syria will return experienced in warfare to join an insurgency in Dagestan and its other North Caucasus provinces by militants fighting for an Islamic state. Violence in the region claims lives almost daily. Fifteen men from Novosasitli alone have died in shootouts with Russian forces in the last four years, locals say. Analysts say fighters could also try to strike during the 2014 Winter Olympics in February in nearby Sochi. President Vladimir Putin, who has staked his reputation on the Games, has said […]

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Boosted by foreign Shi'ite militia, Assad's forces advance on Aleppo

AMMAN (Reuters) – Syrian government forces backed by foreign Shi’ite Muslim militia advanced on rebels in the northern city of Aleppo on Tuesday, bent on recapturing districts from opposition brigades weakened by infighting, activists said. They said that rebels saw the threat of President Bashar al-Assad wresting back Aleppo, Syria’s former commercial hub and once most populous city, as so grave that Islamist brigades, including an al Qaeda affiliate, had declared an emergency and summoned all fighters to head to the fronts. After 2-1/2 years of conflict, which started when Assad’s forces fired on pro-democracy demonstrators and escalated into a full-blown civil war, the fighting has settled into a rough stalemate in which scores of people are killed every day. Aleppo has been divided roughly in half by the warring parties for much of the conflict but the government is determined to reassert total control to solidify a foothold […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Boosted by foreign Shi’ite militia, Assad’s forces advance on Aleppo

AMMAN (Reuters) – Syrian government forces backed by foreign Shi’ite Muslim militia advanced on rebels in the northern city of Aleppo on Tuesday, bent on recapturing districts from opposition brigades weakened by infighting, activists said. They said that rebels saw the threat of President Bashar al-Assad wresting back Aleppo, Syria’s former commercial hub and once most populous city, as so grave that Islamist brigades, including an al Qaeda affiliate, had declared an emergency and summoned all fighters to head to the fronts. After 2-1/2 years of conflict, which started when Assad’s forces fired on pro-democracy demonstrators and escalated into a full-blown civil war, the fighting has settled into a rough stalemate in which scores of people are killed every day. Aleppo has been divided roughly in half by the warring parties for much of the conflict but the government is determined to reassert total control to solidify a foothold […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple