Russia Says Working with U.S. in Syria Would Be Ideal Solution as Both Struggle to Defeat Last of ISIS



[ad_1]

Moscow's top diplomat has said he would like to be a member of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), which has resisted its attempts to eradicate it in Syria.

In an interview Monday with Spanish newspaper El País, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recalled Vladimir Putin's September 2015 President of the United Nations to fight against armed groups in Syria. Lavrov said that it would have been "the ideal solution" to tackle ISIS, which the US has created as part of a separate coalition that it created in 2014 without seeking permission from the Syrian government, an ally of Russia and Iran.

"It is regrettable since terrorists threatening all members of the international community and no one can take refuge in 'a safe harbor,'" Lavrov said of Washington's unwillingness to work with Moscow to finish off ISIS or find peace in Syria.

"By the way, I would like to point out the difference of status in the armed forces of the country." The Russian military is in Syrian territory at the request of the legitimate authorities of the country, but the presence of the USA is in the Syrian Arab Republic without the consent of its government, "he added.

GettyImages-969783108 US Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford (left), Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, meets with Russian Army General Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia, at Königstedt Manor in Helsinki, Finland, on June 8. The US and Russia President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. DOMINIQUE A. PINEIRO / U.S. Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff / Lehtikuva / AFP / Getty Images

Putin has long called for the international community to work with the United States to train President Barack Obama. Then-Republican candidate Donald Trump said that it would be so influential that it would "be nice if we got together with Russia and knocked the hell out of ISIS." In a phone conversation just after Trump 's victory, he appeared in Russia.

A Kremlin readout of the conversation at the time stated that the two agreed to "unite efforts in the struggle against the common enemy number one-international terrorism and extremism" and that "in this vein, issues of resolving the crisis in Syria were also discussed . " As Trump took office, this alliance became strained to persist with accusations that the Republican leader colluded with Moscow in the presidential race as well as diverging views on the Syrian conflict.

Trump President of the United States President of the United States, Bashar al-Assad via a U.S.-sponsored rebel and jihadi insurgency, he also oversaw two rounds of strikes against Assad's government in the wake of alleged chemical weapons attacks. Both the US and Russia helped by ISIS by leading parallel offensives-the former through the Syrian Democratic Forces and the other Syrian military and various militias, many supported by Iran-but they failed to come together .

Coordination between the United States of America and the United States of America has been deconflicted to avoid international incidents, despite Moscow's appeals for Trump to enhance this cooperation. Following their most recent meeting in July, Trump appeared willing to support Russia's humanitarian efforts in Syria, but no conclusive agreement emerged in the following months.

In the meantime, ISIS continues to lose ground on both fronts. However, both the U.S.-led and Russia-backed campaigns began their final push against the jihadis in September, the last steps were difficult and difficult.

GettyImages-1057266192 United States forces and members of the Syrian Democratic Forces patrol the Kurdish-held town of Al-Darbasiyah, in northeastern Syria, bordering Turkey, on November 4. The beleaguered US-backed offensive against ISIS renewed against Pentagon-sponsored Kurdish fighters. DELIL SOULEIMAN / AFP / Getty Images

Citing the Defense Department, the lead inspector general for Operation Inherent Resolve-the Pentagon's official anti-ISIS mission in Iraq and Syria-said Monday in its official report that "ISIS has largely evolved from a land-holding terrorist entity to an insurgency." A network of clandestine cells "and" that US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces face a difficult struggle against ISIS near Hajin, "a town on the eastern bank of the River Euphrates in eastern Syria, one of the group's last physical holdouts.

The Syrian Democratic Forces have sustained a number of casualties in recent weeks as they struggled to advance. After Turkey launched on Kurdish positions in northern Syria, the local U.S.-backed militia suspended its operations against ISIS. Turkey and the U.S. are both members of the NATO Western military alliance and the opponents of Assad, but Ankara considers certain Kurdish groups to be involved in terrorist organizations.

When asked this week if the Pentagon would condemn these strikes against Kurdish fighters it was earlier Iranian attacks on ISIS positions just three miles from U.S. troops in eastern Syria, Central Command Spokesman Navy Captain Bill Urban simply told Newsweek, "The Syrian Democratic Forces have been set up by the United States of America in the United States of America." The SDF has been an essential coalition partner in the defeat of ISIS in Syria.

On the other side of the Euphrates River, pro-government fighters also face a fight against jihadis, as Syrian troops in another ISIS pocket in southern Syria's volcanic fields of Tulul al-Safa. The Syrian military also faces a ceasefire in its fight against the last bastion of the 2011 Islamist-led insurgency in the northwestern province of Idlib, where the U.S. threatened to intervene should a humanitarian disaster erupt.

[ad_2]
Source link