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The U.S. and its Western allies avoided triggering a wider war in Syria last Saturday when they retaliated with precision missile strikes against President Bashar al-Assad for an alleged chemical weapons attack. But there are plenty of hazards ahead that could draw the big powers, as well as neighboring countries, deeper into the Syria quagmire — and into direct conflict with each other, however determined they are to avoid it, analysts said.

Washington and its allies may have given up on seeking the removal of Assad from power, and the rebels may now control only a few pockets of the north near the Turkish border and in the south adjacent to Jordan, but the Syria conflict remains far from over.

Microconflicts abound — although they are less “micro” from the point of view of those involved — with a struggle intensifying over the consolidation of spheres of influence. Several outside powers are determined not only to shape post-war Syria, but to retain significant long-term roles for themselves, as well as to maintain territory they currently control.

In the north, Turkey is continuing to press an offensive against America’s Syrian Kurdish allies and is threatening to expand it. Sunni Arab rebels and Kurds are at each other’s throats, risking drawing in the U.S. Al-Qaida remains a menacing and influential force. And remnants of the Islamic State group have yet to be mopped up.

Aside from Turkey, substantial territory is occupied by Iranian-controlled militias, including Tehran’s Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah, which has developed a number of military bases in the country, and Iranian-led Shi’ites from Iraq and Afghanistan. 

And the biggest challenge all foreign powers face in Syria is how to control their proxies and ostensible partners in a complex multisided struggle involving an array of militias and fighters and countries, all with conflicting agendas.

There was a sense of relief among Western political and military leaders in the hours after the U.S., France and Britain launched a barrage of 105 cruise missiles to obliterate three Syrian government facilities. The worst-case scenario of the Russians responding to the punitive strikes hadn’t materialized. And the Syrian military’s efforts to shoot down incoming missiles failed — despite claims to the contrary by both Moscow and Damascus, said Pentagon officials.

​Israel and Iran

But the threat of escalation remains, despite its absence Saturday, and one of the biggest risks, said analysts, rests with a menacing threat dynamic unfolding between Israel and Iran in Syria.

“The scale of Tehran’s military expansion across Syrian territory and the resulting threat that this poses both to Israel and regional security has become unsustainable, and the risk of a major conflagration and a potentially uncontrollable cycle of escalation has never been higher,” said Charles Lister, an analyst with the Middle East Institute, a Washington-based research organization, and author of the book The Syrian Jihad.

Israel has launched dozens of cross-border airstrikes targeting mainly Hezbollah in the past few years, with the latest earlier this month, when at least seven Iranian military personnel, including a top commander, were killed in an Israeli missile strike on an Iranian drone base in Homs province.

On Tuesday, Bahram Ghassemi, the spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, threatened reprisal, warning, “Tel Aviv will be punished for its aggressive action. The occupying Zionist regime will, sooner or later, receive an appropriate response to its actions.”

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman warned after the missile strike on the drone base that Israel “will not allow Iranian entrenchment in Syria, no matter the price to pay. We have no other option. Allowing Iran to strengthen itself in Syria is like accepting that the Iranians strangle us.”

Lister said the U.S. needs to include the issue of the military presence of Iran and Hezbollah “within its broader strategic calculations on Syria policy, and in coordination with allies, it should seek to aggressively contain and deter Iran and prevent the worst-case scenario from becoming truly inevitable.”

U.S. options

It remains unclear, though, how Washington can do that — at least, without courting the danger of being drawn deeper into a conflict that’s threatening to spill over in all directions, more so now than at any other time in the seven-year conflict. Containing Iran would also seem impossible, if U.S. President Donald Trump follows through on his stated aim of withdrawing soon the approximately 2,000 U.S. troops stationed in northern Syria, where they are tasked with mopping up IS fighters but are serving also as protectors of the Syrian Kurds.

On Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported that one idea being raised by the Trump administration is to assemble a coalition force drawn from Gulf Arab states and Egypt to replace the U.S. military in northeast Syria, with the aim of it combating extremist groups and containing Iranian influence.

But analysts caution any Arab troops deployed would find themselves directly confronting Iranian Revolutionary Guardsmen and Shi’ite militias, prompting the likelihood of war spreading across the Middle East.

Turkey would also be unlikely to welcome Egyptian, Saudi or Emirati forces arrayed along its southern border, said analysts, and it is unclear how the force would be able to operate, as Egypt is supportive of the Assad government, while Saudi Arabia and the Emirates aren’t.

Even without throwing an Arab force into the equation, the endgame of the Syrian conflict is fraught with increasing unknowns and dangers. Despite a display of unity between the leaders of Russia, Turkey and Iran at a recent conference in Ankara hosted by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, there are signs that the current understanding between the three may not have long to run.

Both Russia and Iran are pressing Turkey to relinquish control of the Kurdish city of Afrin and to hand it over to the Syrian government. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was the most explicit, expressing disapproval of Turkey’s military presence in northern Syria and complaining it is in violation of Syria’s “territorial integrity.”

“Tehran appears to be increasingly concerned about Turkey’s plans in the north of the country,” according to Hamidreza Azizi, a political scientist at Iran’s Shahid Beheshti University.
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Britain’s broadcast regulator has opened seven investigations into Russian state-owned RT television channel, citing an increase in potential violations of impartiality rules since the poisoning of a former Russian spy and his daughter.

Ofcom, the media regulator, said the probes would determine whether RT owner TV Novosti is “fit and proper” to continue to hold a British broadcast license.

Ofcom said that until recently, TV Novosti’s “overall compliance record has not been materially out of line with other broadcasters.” But Ofcom added it has seen a “significant increase in the number of programs on the RT service that warrant investigation.”

Britain has accused Russia of poisoning former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, with a military-grade nerve agent in the British city of Salisbury on March 4, a charge Russia denies.

The Russian television channel maintains its editorial approach has been consistent since the poisoning.

“Our editorial approach has not changed since the events in Salisbury, and we will be directly addressing this matter with the regulator,” said RT spokeswoman Anna Belkina.

Separately, RT’s editor-in-chief, Margarita Simonyan, acknowledged Britain’s investigation and joked the TV channel was not responsible for the death of Sergei Skripal’s cat.

The cat was put down after being found in Skripal’s home in southern England.
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Cambridge Analytica’s ex-CEO, Alexander Nix, has refused to testify before the U.K. Parliament’s media committee, citing British authorities’ investigation into his former company’s alleged misuse of data from millions of Facebook accounts in political campaigns.

Committee Chairman Damian Collins announced Nix’s decision a day before his scheduled appearance but flatly rejected the notion that he should be let off the hook, saying Nix hasn’t been charged with a crime and there are no active legal proceedings against him.

“There is therefore no legal reason why Mr. Nix cannot appear,” Collins said in a statement. “The committee is minded to issue a formal summons for him to appear on a named day in the very near future.”

Nix gave evidence to the committee in February, but was recalled after former Cambridge Analytica staffer Christopher Wylie sparked a global debate over electronic privacy when he alleged the company used data from millions of Facebook accounts to help U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign. Wylie worked on Cambridge Analytica’s “information operations” in 2014 and 2015.

Wylie has also said the official campaign backing Britain’s exit from the European Union had access to the Facebook data.

Cambridge Analytica has previously said that none of the Facebook data it acquired from an academic researcher was used in the Trump campaign. The company also says it did no paid or unpaid work on the Brexit campaign. The company did not respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The Information Commissioner’s Office said Tuesday that it had written to Nix to “invite him” to be interviewed by investigators. The office is investigating Facebook and 30 other organizations over their use of data and analytics.

“Our investigation is looking at whether criminal and civil offences have been committed under the Data Protection Act,” the office said in a statement.

Nix’s refusal to appear comes as the seriousness of the British inquiry becomes more evident.

Facebook has said it directed Cambridge Analytica to delete all of the data harvested from user accounts as soon as it learned of the problem.

But former Cambridge Analytica business development director Brittany Kaiser testified Tuesday that the U.S. tech giant didn’t really try to verify Cambridge Analytica’s assurances that it had done so.

“I find it incredibly irresponsible that a company with as much money as Facebook … had no due diligence mechanisms in place for protecting the data of U.K. citizens, U.S. citizens or their users in general,” she said.

Kaiser suggested that the number of individuals whose Facebook data was misused could be far higher than the 87 million acknowledged by the Silicon Valley giant.

In an atmosphere where data abuse was rife, Kaiser told lawmakers she believed the leadership of the Leave.EU campaign had combined data from members of the U.K. Independence Party and customers from two insurance companies, Eldon Insurance and GoSkippy Insurance. The data was then sent the University of Mississippi for analysis.

“If the personal data of U.K. citizens who just wanted to buy car insurance was used by GoSkippy and Eldon Insurance for political purposes, as may have been the case, people clearly did not opt in for their data to be used in this way by Leave.EU,” she said in written testimony to the committee.

Leave.EU’s communications director, Andy Wigmore, called Kaiser’s statements a “litany of lies.”

It is how the data was used that alarms some members of the committee and has captured the attention of the public.

An expert on propaganda told the committee Monday that Cambridge Analytica used techniques developed by the Nazis to help Trump’s presidential campaign, turning Muslims and immigrants into an “artificial enemy” to win support from fearful voters.

University of Essex lecturer Emma Briant, who has for a decade studied the SCL Group – a conglomerate of companies, including Cambridge Analytica – interviewed company founder Nigel Oakes when she was doing research for a book. Oakes compared Trump’s tactics to those of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler in singling out Jews for reprisals.

“Hitler attacked the Jews, because … the people didn’t like the Jews,” he said on tapes of the interview conducted with Briant. “He could just use them to . leverage an artificial enemy. Well that’s exactly what Trump did. He leveraged a Muslim.”
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Vitaly Bespalov, a 23-year-old journalism school graduate, had no idea what to expect when he arrived at a nondescript four-story business center in St. Petersburg to interview for a job.

Everything about the building at Savushkina 55 seemed odd. Security was heavy and the windows were tinted. Guards dressed in camouflage demanded his passport and his home address before letting him into the building. And, as he negotiated his entry, Bespalov noticed a woman enter the lobby in a rage.

“She was yelling something about how she refused to be part of this,” says Bespalov. “Everything about the place was strange.”

The year was 2014 and, as Bespalov was to learn, the building was the home of the Internet Research Agency – the company that would later be indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller on charges of conspiring to tamper in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign.

At that time, however, the agency was more concerned with the aftermath of another election – this time at home.

In December 2011, tens of thousands of Russians took to the streets and social media, alleging the Kremlin had carried out mass fraud in the country’s parliamentary elections. As Russians shared evidence of ballot stuffing and called others to join the protests, state media stayed silent. The difference in realities was glaring.

“The Kremlin decided they needed to make the online world and state television tell the same story,” says Bespalov, who described his experiences working at the notorious troll factory to VOA.

The aspiring journalist had moved from his native Siberia earlier to St. Petersburg on the promise of a job with a local news website. But the job fell through.  

As a newcomer to St. Petersburg, Bespalov sent out resume after resume, looking for anything that involved editing or reporting.

The rejections piled up until one day the phone rang. He was invited for an interview. Even better: The job paid double the going rate for writing gigs.

“I had no idea who it was,” Bespalov says. “They just called and told me to show up tomorrow at this address – Savushkina 55. And I didn’t understand what the job was or what the company was, but I said, ‘Sure, why not?’”

Having negotiated his way through the heavy security, he was shown into an interview with a woman named Anna. He took a writing test and showed his writing samples – sympathetic takes on Russia’s opposition movement, LGBT rights, and the feminist art collective Pussy Riot.

“From those articles alone, my political views were obvious. I still don’t understand why they took me,” he says. “But Anna came back with a smile and said, ‘Well, we don’t cover the kind of stories you do, but you know how to write.’”

He got the job.

Inside the troll factory

On his first day, Bespalov was assigned to cover the war in eastern Ukraine. Sort of. He was told to rewrite articles from other websites for a handful of fake Ukrainian news sites. His task: to change the text in order to give articles the appearance of originality and a distinctly pro-Russian slant.

“We’d switch the word ‘annexation’ of Crimea for ‘reunification,’ or call the government in Kyiv ‘a fascist junta’ while writing favorably about the separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine,” he says.

If there had been mere doubts before, Bespalov now knew for sure: He was in the epicenter of a propaganda machine.

With the realization came a dilemma, he says. “I could either leave right away, so as not to ruin my reputation as a journalist,” he says. “Or, I thought, I can stay and find out more and publish a big story about it somewhere.”

Bespalov went undercover. A mole among trolls.

He paints a gloomy picture of troll life inside Savushkina 55. Teams worked eight- to 12-hour shifts around the clock, seven days a week. Department heads monitored their work. Surveillance cameras were everywhere. Conversation among employees was discouraged.

In quick chats during cigarette breaks, Bespalov came to the conclusion that most trolls cared or thought little about what they were doing.  

“I know people who’ve been there for three years and never thought once what it was all about. They were there for the money,” he says.

Bespalov sketches out a highly structured operation, noting a fake news division on one floor, and bloggers and social media commentators on another. Also within the structure – a graphics department – which seemingly built an endless number of picture memes called “demotivators” for everyone to use.

Bespalov concludes the point of all this was to complete what he calls a “circle of lies” – a feedback loop where troll postings reinforced Kremlin news on state media, pushing one central idea which he characterizes as “Make Russia Great Again.”

In contrast to 2011, the internet and state media had now merged into one.

“The work was directed at the Russian audience,” Bespalov says. “Even the fake Ukrainian sites weren’t there to change minds in Ukraine. The point was to remove Russians’ doubts about the war in Ukraine and about ourselves because we have a weak economy, because we have few political freedoms. And because Russia can’t launch a company like Apple or develop an innovative space program. But what we can do is create the appearance of a great country. Not make the country better, but create the impression we have.”

Exit strategy

In the end, Bespalov spent three-and-a-half months at the Internet Research Agency. He says that once he felt he’d learned all he could, he quit. And he did publish his investigation – anonymously, out of fear for his safety. In fact, Bespalov was threatened, he says, after others at the IRA began suspecting he was the source of the article.

But eventually, the threats faded – in part, he suspects, because it turns out he wasn’t the only journalist working undercover at the IRA. Other local media outlets had come out with investigations.

“By this point, everybody knew about it,” he says.

And the troll factory would have remained old news if not for its role in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections.  

Bespalov says he has little light to shed on that operation, other than that the agency had started advertising for English-speaking positions around the time he left.

“We see that all the journalists who have written from inside the troll factory worked there back in 2014 or 2015,” he says. “That tells me that the system has gotten more cautious. Accidental types like me no longer can get work there.”  

Nonetheless, Bespalov’s willingness to talk about his experiences have made him a go-to source for Western media covering the election scandal – and a punching bag for Russian state media.

A recent NBC News report featuring Bespalov prompted Russia’s state media to run a piece disparaging his claims. The program also pilfered his social media accounts – mocking his alternative lifestyle, tattoos and liberal political views.  

Bespalov says his actions have been misrepresented on both sides of the Atlantic.

“In the U.S., they label me as ‘Vitaly Bespalov, former troll,’ not a journalist,” he says. “And from the Russian side, I’m a liar and traitor. A lot of my friends tell me, ‘Enough already. No more interviews. Have you lost your mind? Do you want to get killed? You’ve told your story and talking to more people about it won’t change anything.’”

Indeed, there were indications that the trolls recently geared up for another election – this time Russia’s 2018 presidential campaign.

An account on Telegram by a user named “Kremlebot,” who claims to work in the Internet Research Agency’s Russian division, wrote that employees were tasked with boosting voter turnout – a widely acknowledged goal of Kremlin spin doctors eager to lend a veneer of legitimacy to Vladimir Putin’s reelection bid. Requirements included sending selfies from polling stations to agency managers as well as playing up the competitiveness of the race.

Could “Kremlebot” be housed in Savushkina 55? Unlikely. Today, a giant “For Rent” sign hangs in the windows of Bespalov’s old office.

The Internet Research Agency had already moved on — and the trolls along with it.

 
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Some of Europe’s biggest venture capital firms are buying into sales of new virtual coins or asking their investors to give them the freedom to do so, in a sign of mainstream investor backing for the booming but controversial crowd-funding tool.

Germany’s HV Holtzbrinck Ventures, which has more than 1 billion euros ($1.23 billion) under management, is talking to its investors about changing the terms of its next fund so it can buy tokens directly, Jan Miczaika, a partner at the firm, told Reuters.

Lakestar, the Zurich-based firm run by Klaus Hommels, has made at least four investments in crypto and blockchain-related businesses since early 2017, among them ShapeShift, an exchange, and Blockchain, a wallet provider, and it is preparing to invest in a combination of coin and equity stakes in more.

Smaller and newer funds like BlueYard Capital and Fabric Ventures are focusing specifically on investments around blockchain — a distributed ledger technology that can remove the need for centralizing institutions — often by buying virtual coins.

Venture capitalists usually take equity stakes in start-ups, gaining a say in how the company is run and legal and governance certainties over their investments. Buying into initial coin offerings (ICOs), as the sale of digital tokens is known, can be far more risky. They offer little more than a promise the tokens will be worth more in future.

But with hundreds of start-ups — ICOs last year raised $6.3 billion — seeking to raise capital for new projects, investors say that to gain access to cutting-edge technology they need the flexibility to compete.

“It’s the internet in the early 1990s, you have to experiment,” said Nicolas Brand, a partner at Lakestar. “I have to find the best way of backing the best entrepreneurs and we need to be agile in how we invest.”

Regulators have raised serious questions about the transparency of ICOs and the risks of scams, although authorities in countries from Switzerland to France have disclosed plans to attract new launches.

Supporters say blockchain will disrupt industries from finance to logistics and that ICOs are a novel way of crowd-funding.

Tokens are the route to make money. They embody the idea that consumers will need to own and use them to buy services, from playing computer games to online shopping. When demand for those products spreads, the token prices will rise, creating value for earlier owners like venture capitalists.

“The [blockchain] technology is very exciting. Ninety-five percent of the tokens will go to zero. On the other hand, the other 5 percent are very interesting and could go on to revolutioniZe the market,” said Miczaika at HV Holtzbrinck.

Equity to ICO

Unlike some big U.S. funds, most big European venture capitalists are avoiding the world’s biggest ICO, by messaging app Telegram, people familiar with the funds say, citing concerns about the amount — a reported $1.7 billion — it has raised.

Broader worries about the quality of teams looking to cash in on ICOs are common, and some funds say that far from being a threat to the venture capital model, most ICOs are a fad.

Those that survive will find themselves wanting the support and hand-holding that conventional venture investment offers.

“We need to get our heads around ICOs, but I don’t see it as a threat. I don’t think I’ve missed a company which I wish I’d invested in but couldn’t because it did an ICO,” said Suranga Chandratillake, partner at London-based Balderton Capital.

To date, venture activity has focused on crypto companies like HV Holtzbrinck’s investment in ICO platform Upvest or Point Nine Capital’s stake in peer-to-peer bitcoin lender Bitbond, which tapped into the crypto-trading craze and followed on from a series of investments by well-known U.S. venture funds.

Investors said the next round of activity would target projects offering the building blocks for blockchain’s development, such as software development networks. They will benefit if the largely unproven technology matures.

Buying into the coins is necessary for aligning themselves to such projects, they argue.

“We came to the conclusion that if we really want to do decentralized tokens we have to be a part of it,” said Ciaran O’Leary, who co-founded Berlin-based BlueYard and invested in the 2017 ICO by data storage network Filecoin, which was worth an estimated $200 million.

Risks

ICOs also present major governance and legal concerns, including how to store coins safely after several large hacks.

To keep their investments safe, venture firms are looking at storing coins offline or in wallets where no transaction can take place without the agreement of multiple individuals.

Max Mersch, a partner at Fabric Ventures, said his firm had also introduced multi-year lock-ups prohibiting quick dumping of coins, to encourage longer-term investment horizons and so partners had time to shape governance.

Risks aside, venture capitalists say the potential impact of tokens is too hard to ignore.

“A token is a very powerful innovation and in the best token projects, the fund-raising is actually a byproduct,” said Lakestar’s Brand said. “The token is about activating network effects on steroids,” he said, predicting they would have the power to take on “rival monoliths like Facebook”.
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A Russian official says a team of chemical weapons experts is set to make a visit Wednesday to the site east of Syria’s capital where a suspected chemical attack killed dozens of people earlier this month.

The investigators from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons arrived in Syria on Saturday, but so far have not been able to begin their work in Douma.

The U.S. envoy to the OPCW, Ken Ward, said Monday it was his understanding Russia had already visited the site and he raised concerns of tampering before the OPCW carries out its fact-finding mission.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denied the accusation, telling the BBC he guarantees Russia “has not tampered with the site.”

Lavrov said that evidence cited by the United States, Britain and France to justify last Saturday’s missile attack on three Syrian chemical weapons facilities was based “on media reports and social media.” He denied any chemical weapons attack had occurred, accusing Britain of staging the attack.

Russia further blamed the Saturday airstrikes for the delays in the OPCW team being able to access Douma.

Syrian media reported another missile attack early Thursday in Homs province, saying government air defenses shot down most of the missiles fired at an air base. The reports did not say who was responsible, and the U.S. military said neither it nor the coalition it leads was operating in that area at the time.

OPCW Director-General Ahmet Üzümcü said Monday that Russian and Syrian officials had informed the team that there are “still pending security issues to be worked out before any deployment could take place” to Douma.

In Moscow, Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said the mission was not allowed in because it lacked approval from the United Nation’s Department for Safety and Security.

U.N. officials in New York disputed the claim.

“The United Nations has provided the necessary clearances for the OPCW team to go about its work in Douma,” said U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric. “We have not denied the team any request for it to go to Douma.”

He added that U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres is very supportive of the investigation.

“The secretary-general wants to see the fact-finding mission have access to all the sites it needs to have access to, so that we can have the most thorough and full picture of the facts,” Dujarric said. 

EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said ahead of a ministerial meeting there is a clear need to push for re-launching a U.N.-led peace process for Syria. At the U.N. Security Council, France has proposed a new draft resolution that addresses three key aspects of the conflict — chemical weapons, humanitarian issues and the political process. 

“So, this is our road map, and we will work very hard, in good faith, in good spirit, to listen to everybody, in order to try to move ahead with our draft resolution and move forward toward an inclusive political settlement of the crisis,” France’s envoy François Delattre told reporters Monday.

Margaret Besheer contributed to this report.
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A Russian investigative journalist, who recently wrote about the deaths of Russian mercenaries in Syria, has died after falling from his 50th-floor balcony in the city of Yekaterinburg.

Maxim Borodin, 32, was found badly injured on the pavement under his balcony and taken to a hospital, where he died Sunday, according to his employer, the news website Novy Den (New Day).

Local police said they did not see any foul play, but his death prompted intense speculation among friends and colleagues.

Borodin’s friend, Vyacheslav Bashkov, wrote on Facebook that Borodin contacted him early in the morning on Wednesday, the day before the fall, and told him that there was a man with a gun on his balcony, and that several others in masks and camouflage clothing were lurking in the stairwell leading to his apartment building.

Bashkov said that Borodin had called back an hour later and said he had been mistaken and that he thought the armed men were probably taking part in a training exercise.

Borodin regularly covered high-profile corruption cases and crime in Russia. In February, he broke a story about Russian mercenaries who died in an armed confrontation with U.S. forces near Deir-Ezzor, Syria.

Last year, he gave an interview to a Russian independent channel TV Rain and talked about the controversial film Matilda, then was subsequently hit on the head by an unknown assailant with a metal pipe.

Russia ranks first on the European Federation of Journalists list of countries with the highest number of journalists murdered in Europe.

Since 1992, 38 journalists have been murdered in Russia, according to the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists. Most of those cases remain unsolved.
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Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s office said on Monday an “irresponsible” migration policy on the part of the European Union had stoked religious intolerance in western Europe that was threatening Jews there.

His office issued a statement a week after Orban was re-elected by a landslide to a third straight term with a fierce anti-immigrant campaign that vilified Hungarian-born, Jewish-American tycoon George Soros for promoting liberal open-door values in Hungary and elsewhere in central and eastern Europe.

The right-wing nationalist premier has presented himself as the savior of Hungary’s sovereignty and Christian values against what he calls an “invasion” of Muslim migrants. His office used the occasion of Hungary’s Holocaust Remembrance Day to reiterate its strong criticism of EU migration policies.

“There is only one way to counter worryingly strengthening anti-Semitic phenomema…Europe must return to its values stemming from Judaeo-Christian traditions,” Orban’s office said.

“The religious intolerance that threatens Europe – which is a direct consequence of the irresponsible migration policy of Brussels – has translated into unprecedented violence in the western half of the continent,” it said, alluding to a number of deadly Islamist militant attacks since 2015.

Orban has repeatedly pledged zero tolerance of anti-Semitism. But some comments he made last year rattled Hungarian Jews, including praise for Miklos Horthy, Hungary’s wartime Nazi-allied leader who only suspended deportations of Jews in 1944 after half a million had been sent to the gas chambers.

Orban has also played up the idea that “external forces and international powers” like the EU, which Hungary joined in 2004, and the United Nations want to meddle in internal Hungarian affairs and force the country to accept migrants.

He has said his government’s policy of rejecting migrants also serves the interests of European Jewish communities.

However, Orban has drawn strong western EU and U.S. criticism for drafting so-called “Stop Soros” legislation that would slap a 25 percent tax on foreign donations to NGOs that the government says back migration in Hungary.

Orban told state radio last month activists were being paid by Soros to “transform Hungary into an immigrant country.” Soros has rejected the campaign against him as “distortions and lies” meant to create a false external enemy to distract Hungarians.
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European foreign ministers and France’s parliament meet Monday to discuss their response to the joint U.S., French and British strikes on Syria. The military action has sparked sharp divisions, even though French President Emmanuel Macron insisted Sunday night they carried international legitimacy.

EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg and France’s parliament in Paris are expected to question, but not seriously test, the decision by French and British leaders to join Washington in striking suspected chemical weapons facilities in Syria. Some EU leaders, like Germany’s Angela Merkel, have called the military action necessary — and the bigger debate may be on figuring out Europe’s response to Syria’s ally, Russia.

In France, several leading opposition politicians have sharply criticized French involvement in the strikes. But Monday’s parliamentary session on Syria will be limited to a debate only — and French President Emmanuel Macron’s La Republique En Marche party dominates the National Assembly.

During a televised interview Sunday night, Macron said the coalition had “full international legitimacy to intervene” in striking Syria for humanitarian reasons. He called the action a retaliation, not an act of war, and said France had proof chemical weapons had been used by the Syrian government during a recent attack on the rebel-held town of Douma. He also said France has “not declared war on the regime of Bashar al-Assad.”

Macron said he had convinced President Donald Trump to keep U.S. forces in Syria — a version later disputed by the White House — and to carry out only limited strikes.

While Washington and its European allies are united over the strikes, they may be divided over how to proceed.

Macron called Russia “complicit” in the alleged chemical attacks, by using diplomatic means to render the international community incapable of responding to them. But he also said it was important to work together with Russia, Turkey and Iran in finding a solution to the Syrian crisis. Macron and President Trump are due to hold talks in Washington next week.
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Russia will not delay adopting legislation in response to new U.S. sanctions, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Monday, RIA news agency reported.

Senior members of the lower house of parliament have said they are considering legislation to give the Kremlin powers to ban or restrict a list of U.S. imports.

Ryabkov said Moscow was discussing what he called Washington’s abuse of the dollar’s status as the global reserve currency.
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Prime Minister Theresa May is set to face British lawmakers to explain her decision to launch airstrikes against Syria without a vote in Parliament.

Britain, the United States and France hit targets in Syria Saturday in response to a reported chemical attack in Douma.

Parliament returns Monday after a spring break, and was not consulted about the action. The government is not legally bound to seek Parliament’s approval for military strikes, though it is customary to do so.

May plans to tell lawmakers that the airstrikes were “in Britain’s national interest,” were carried out to stop further suffering from chemical weapons attacks and had broad international support. 

The government says it will seek an emergency parliamentary debate on the airstrikes Monday, though that is unlikely to satisfy angry opposition lawmakers.
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Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has promised to diversify his nation’s economy and address the needs of its increasingly young population. Mike O’Sullivan reports on the heir-apparent to the Saudi throne’s multination charm offensive in Europe and the United States, which recently wrapped up in Spain.
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Hundreds of thousands of Catalan separatists rallied in downtown Barcelona on Sunday to demand the release of high-profile secessionist leaders being held in pre-trial detention.

Protesters waved Catalan separatist flags behind a huge banner that read “for rights and liberties, for democracy and unity, we want them back home!”

The demonstration was organized by two pro-independence grassroots groups, the National Catalan Assembly and Omnium, whose presidents are among the nine separatists in prison awaiting trial for their roles in last year’s failed breakaway bid by the northeastern Spanish region.

The regional chapters of Spain’s two leading labor unions, along with other civil society groups, supported the protest despite the complaints from some members who don’t want secession for Catalonia. Barcelona police said 315,000 people participated in the protest.

“The majority of Catalans, regardless of their political position, agree that pre-trial jail is not justified,” said regional UGT union leader Camil Ros. “What we as labor unions are asking for now is dialogue.”

The secession movement in the wealthy region has plunged Spain into its deepest institutional crisis in decades.

Separatist lawmakers defied court orders and held an ad-hoc referendum on independence in October. Their subsequent declaration of independence for the region led to a crackdown by Spanish authorities acting to defend the Spanish Constitution, which declares the nation “indivisible.”

Pro-independence parties retained a slim majority in Catalonia’s parliament after an election in December, but courts have blocked their attempts to elect as regional chief any lawmaker who is either behind bars or has fled the country.

The latest opinion poll published by the Catalan government in February said that support for independence had decreased to 40 percent from near 49 percent in October. The poll surveyed 1,200 people and had a margin of error of 2.8 percent.
…

France is urging Russia to join in renewed peace efforts after Western missile strikes on Syria aimed at punishing Bashar Assad for an alleged chemical attack, while the Syrian leader was said to have appeared unfazed Sunday in a meeting with Russian politicians.

The U.S., France and Britain launched dozens of airstrikes early Saturday at sites they said were linked to a chemical weapons program. Assad and his close ally, Russia, have denied government forces ever used such weapons.

Russian politicians who met with Assad on Sunday said he was in high spirits, while Assad was quoted in state media as saying the Western strikes were based on “lies and misinformation” at the U.N. Security Council.

Dmitry Sablin, a member of the lower house of the Russian parliament who was part of the delegation that met with Assad Monday, said the Syrian leader appeared upbeat and believed the airstrikes would unify the country.

Syrian opposition activists and first responders say a chemical attack on the town of Douma, near the capital, killed more than 40 people on April 7. A week later, the government regained full control of the town following a surrender deal with the rebels there, and on Sunday it deployed another 5,000 security forces in Douma.

Douma was the last rebel holdout in the eastern Ghouta suburbs, the target of a massive government offensive in February and March that killed hundreds of people and displaced tens of thousands.

Syrian officials and state media have boasted that the Western strikes failed, saying that Syrian air defenses intercepted most of the missiles. The front-page headline of the government daily Tishrin reads: “Our heroic army shoots down the missiles of aggression.”

The Pentagon says none of the missiles were shot down.

In an interview published Sunday in the Journal du Dimanche newspaper, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian reached out to Russia, saying “we should join our efforts to promote a political process in Syria that would allow a way out of the crisis.” French President Emmanuel Macron was expected to strike a similar tone in a televised interview later Sunday.

France has continued to talk regularly with Russia even as East-West tensions have grown. Macron spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, hours before the Western missile strikes.

British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson told the BBC he hopes there is no need for additional strikes against Syria, but that Britain and its allies will consider further action if Assad uses chemical weapons in the future.

Johnson told the BBC the airstrikes were proportionate and showed “the world has said enough is enough.”

“So far, thank heavens, the Assad regime has not been so foolish to launch another chemical weapons attack,” he said, adding that Britain and its allies “would study what the options were” in the event of another attack.

U.S. President Donald Trump meanwhile defended his use of the phrase “mission accomplished” to refer to the U.S.-led strikes in Syria.

Trump tweeted on Sunday that the mission was “so perfectly carried out, with such precision, that the only way the Fake News Media could demean was by my use of the term ‘Mission Accomplished.'”

“I knew they would seize on this but felt it is such a great Military term, it should be brought back. Use often!” he wrote.

Trump’s use of the phrase Saturday had evoked comparisons with President George W. Bush, who in 2003 stood under a banner that read “Mission Accomplished” as he declared that major combat operations had ended in Iraq six weeks after the invasion. The war dragged on for years.

 
…

Estonia’s largest political party has chosen a new leader, its third one in four years, as it seeks to restore popularity and mend its tarnished image among voters ahead of a parliamentary election next year. 

Delegates for the center-right Reform Party voted Saturday to elect Kaja Kallas. The 40-year-old lawyer and lawmaker at the European Parliament will be the first female leader of a major political party in the Baltic country.

Previous Chairman Hanno Pevkur said in December that he would step down after less than a year in the post.

Kallas is the daughter of former Prime Minister Siim Kallas, who was one of the founders of the Reform Party in the 1990s.

The Reform Party was the top vote-getter in the 2015 election and part of every Estonian government between 1999 and 2016. It held the prime minister’s post between 2005 and 2016 but it saw its popularity wane because of several political scandals. It went into the opposition following a government crisis in late 2016.

Estonia will hold its next election in March 2019. 
…

Thousands of Hungarians protested Saturday in Budapest against what organizers said was an unfair election system that gave Prime Minister Viktor

Orban another landslide victory at the polls after a “hate campaign” against immigrants.

Orban won a third straight term in the April 8 elections after his anti-immigration campaign message secured a strong majority for his ruling Fidesz party in parliament, granting him two-thirds of seats based on preliminary results.

In a Facebook post before the rally, organizers called for a recount, a free media, a new election law, and more efficient co-operation among opposition parties instead of the bickering seen in the run-up to the vote.

Fidesz received 49 percent of national party list votes and its candidates won 91 of 106 single-member constituencies, most of them in rural areas, while leftist opposition candidates carried two-thirds of the voting districts in Budapest.

There was a similar split between ages, with support for Orban’s Fidesz at 37 percent among voters below 30, rising gradually to 46 percent among those older than 50, according to a survey by think tank Median published earlier this week.

In their Facebook post, the rally’s organizers said: “Fidesz’s election system and the government’s hate campaign have pushed the majority into a one-third [parliamentary] minority.”

Protesters gathering outside the Opera House, a 19th-century Neo-Renaissance palace on a majestic downtown avenue, were waving Hungary’s tricolor flag and the European Union flag, accompanied by whistles and horns blaring.

The demonstrators marched toward parliament, chanting: “We are the majority.”

In contrast to Orban’s closing rally in his native Szekesfehervar last week, where the overwhelming majority of supporters were middle-aged and elderly people, the Budapest protest attracted many people from younger generations.

“We are disappointed and I think lots of us are disappointed with the election results, which, I think, were not clean,” said Palma, 26, who declined to give her surname.

Palma, who came to the protest with a friend, said she believed the Hungarian election system had given an unfair advantage to Orban’s Fidesz party. However, she was also displeased with opposition parties.

“They are pathetic,” she said. “It is terrible that they are so weak, unable to reach a compromise, and they kill each other instead of joining forces for us.”

The nationalist Jobbik party and the Socialists, which have the biggest opposition groups in parliament, have said they would join the protest, which was to march to Parliament near the Danube River.

Criticism

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said the election did not offer opposition parties a level playing field amid a host of problems marring a vote that nonetheless generally respected fundamental rights.

Orban, who has transformed himself from a liberal anti-communist hero into a nationalist icon admired by the far-right across Europe, brushed aside the criticism, telling the OSCE,  “Thanks for the contribution.”

A major opposition newspaper has closed since the election, marking another milestone in the gradual decline of media pluralism in Hungary.

The prime minister projected himself as a savior of Hungary’s Christian culture against Muslim migration into Europe, an image that resonated with millions of voters, especially in rural areas.

But the opposition’s poor showing was at least partly of its own making as rival candidates split the anti-government vote in five districts in Budapest, where preliminary results showed a slim Fidesz victory.

“Zero, zero, zero,” Dia Szenasi, 29, said about the opposition, adding that all leftist parties should have joined forces to have a better chance of ousting Orban.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump spoke by phone to the leaders of Britain and France about the joint air strikes the three nations launched on Syria Saturday morning. 

The White House said Trump spoke with British Prime Minister Theresa May and French President Emmanuel Macron in separate phone calls. The three world leaders each affirmed that that the air strikes were “successful and necessary” to deter Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from further use of chemical weapons on the Syrian people.

Earlier, U.S. President Trump commended Britain and France for the joint air strikes with a tweet that said, “A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!”

The U.S. Department of Defense said the strikes targeted three sites believed to be linked to the production of chemical and biological weapons. The attacks were retaliation for suspected chemical attacks near Damascus last weekend that killed more than 40 people.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council Saturday that Trump informed her “the United States is locked and loaded” if Syria uses chemical weapons again.

International reaction to the air strikes ranged from support to intense criticism. 

Syria’s Foreign Ministry said it “condemns in the strongest terms the brutal American-British-French aggression against Syria, which constitutes a flagrant violation of international law.”

Hundreds of Syrians gathered around the capital, Damascus, on Saturday, honking car horns, flashing victory signs and waving Syrian flags in defiance of the joint military strikes. Some shouted, “We are your men, Bashar,” references to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Russian President Vladimir Putin described the attacks as an “act of aggression against a sovereign government” and accused the U.S. of exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in war-torn Syria. 

Russia’s foreign ministry said the air strikes were a failure, maintaining the majority of the rockets fired were intercepted by the Syrian government’s air defense systems. 

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the attacks constitute a criminal act and that U.S., France and Britain will not benefit from them.

“This morning’s attack on Syria is a crime,” Khamenei said on Twitter. “I firmly declare that the Presidents of U.S. and France and British PM committed a major crime. They will gain no benefit; just as they did not while in Iraq, Syria & Afghanistan, over the past years, committing the same criminal acts.”

China’s foreign ministry called Saturday for an independent investigation into the suspected chemical attacks and said a political solution is the only way to resolve the issue. Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said China has consistently opposed the use of force in international relations and that any military action that circumvented the U.N. Security Council violated the basic norms of international law. 

But Britain’s Prime Minister May said there was “no practicable alternative to the use of force” against Syria.

“I judge this action to be in Britain’s national interest,” May said. “We cannot allow the use of chemical weapons to be normalized within Syria, on the streets of the U.K., or anywhere else in the world. We would have preferred an alternative path but, on this occasion, there is none.”

In France, reaction has been mixed. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Saturday the joint military action was justified, limited, proportionate and successful. 

But far left and far right lawmakers sharply criticized France’s decision to join the United States in the strikes. 

Conservative National Front leader Marine Le Pen, who lost the 2017 presidential race to Macron, warned via Twitter France risked its status as an “independent power” and said the strikes could lead to “unforeseen and potentially dramatic consequences.” 

Far left politician Jean-Luc Melenchon also denounced France’s participation on Twitter, calling the strikes an “irresponsible escalation” that did not have European or French parliament support.

Germany, Canada, Australia and Japan expressed support for the air strikes. European Council President Donald Tusk said the bloc “will stand with our allies on the side of justice.”

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lauded the attacks by the U.S., Britain and France on Twitter as proof “their commitment to combat chemical weapons is not limited to declarations alone.”

Netanyahu wrote the air strikes should remind Assad that “his irresponsible efforts to acquire and use weapons of mass destruction, his blatant disregard for international law and his willingness to allow Iran and its affiliates to establish military bases in Syria endanger Syria.”

In Turkey, the air strikes were also well received. 

“We welcome this operation which has eased humanity’s conscience in the face of the attack in Douma, largely suspected to have been carried out by the regime,” Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said. The ministry added that Syria “has a proven track record of crimes against humanity and war crimes.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said those who use chemical weapons “must be held accountable.” 

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned all sides must comply with international law and not dismiss Moscow’s warning that air strikes on its ally could lead to war. 

“I urge all member states to show restraint in these dangerous circumstances and to avoid any acts that could escalate the situation and worsen the suffering of the Syrian people,” Guterres said in a statement.
…

Moments after President Donald Trump concluded his seven-minute broadcast Friday announcing the start of precision airstrikes on Syrian government facilities associated with the development of chemical weapons, loud explosions shook Damascus.

Among the sites struck in a coordinated operation by U.S., French and British forces shortly before dawn prayers was a scientific research center on the outskirts of the Syrian capital, a chemical weapons storage facility near Homs and a nearby command post, the Pentagon said.

There were also reports by political activists that the Syrian Army’s 4th Armored Division, an elite formation commanded by President Bashar al-Assad’s brother, Maher al-Assad, as well as the Republican Guard, were also hit in the strikes. But it remains unclear if they were struck by French and British manned aircraft and cruise missiles rather than by the U.S. military.

From the point of view of those on the receiving end of the one-night operation, the military retaliation by the Western powers may have seemed anything but restrained.

​Restrained strike

The strike, intended to show Western resolve in the face of what Trump called persistent violations of international law by Assad, was larger than last year’s, when the United States fired 58 cruise missiles at Syria in retaliation for a purported chemical weapons attack by government forces on a rebel-held town in the north of the country.

This time about twice the number of cruise missiles were launched by the United States in response to last Saturday’s alleged chemical attack by Assad on the town of Douma just outside of Damascus, in which at least 40 people died and hundreds were sickened.

But the coordinated strike, which included missiles fired from fixed-wing aircraft as well as from warships, has left some analysts puzzled, questioning the limited nature of the punitive raid.

“To many people’s surprise this was somewhat limited. We were expecting at least more airfields, ground force and naval bases to come under attack,” said Arash Aramesh, a national security and foreign policy analyst.

WATCH: U.S. Defense Secretary Mattis Briefs Reporters in Syria Strikes

Speaking in Washington as the operation was close to concluding, U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis appeared somewhat at pains to explain what the objective had been, saying it focused on degrading the Syrian government’s chemical weapons program only.

“We confined it to the chemical weapons-type targets. We were not out to expand this, we were very precise and proportionate, but at the same time it was a heavy strike,” he said.

In London, Britain’s Theresa May also emphasized that the retaliation was focused on Assad’s chemical weapons and ensuring a stop to the “erosion of the international norm that prevents the use of these weapons.” In a television broadcast, May said: “This is not about intervening in the civil war. This is not about regime change.”

She added: “It is about a limited and targeted strike that does not further escalate tensions in the region and that does everything possible to prevent civilian casualties.”

WATCH: President Trump Announces Strikes Against Syria

Too limited to deter?

Some critics question whether the scale of the reprisal may have been too limited to act as a deterrent. Asked whether he could guarantee Assad wouldn’t use deadly poisons again, Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon, “nothing is certain in these kind of matters.”

U.S. officials later highlighted Trump’s statement that the three Western allies were willing “to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents.”

For Steven Bucci, a former senior Pentagon official and a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based think tank, the U.S. president was “sending a message that this isn’t just firing and forgetting and everyone drives home. Clearly, he’s prepared to continue this for some length of time.”

Bucci believes the retaliation has the potential to force Assad to forgo the use of chemical weapons.

“It appears from very initial reports that we’re hitting some very specific targets and facilities that seem to be connected to the production, development, and usage of chemical weapons,” he said. “What may change Assad’s behavior is removing the tools with which he’s been using these horrible things. That’s kind of what you have to do — you can’t just stomp your feet and wag your finger. You have to force him to stop.”

PHOTOS: US, France and Britain Hit Syrian Chemical Facilities

Republican Senator John McCain also highlighted the promise of sustainability. He said: “the United States and our allies have the will and capability to continue imposing those costs, and that Iran and Russia will ultimately be unsuccessful in protecting Assad from our punitive response.”

There were concerns before the punitive strike of a Russian military response. Earlier this week Russian officials warned their forces in Syria would shoot down Western missiles and may even target the planes and ships launching them. On Thursday, a senior Russian official started to walk back that threat, saying the Kremlin would protect Russian personnel on the ground.

That message appeared to have been heard in Washington. 

Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, General Joseph Dunford, who took part in the briefing about the raids alongside Mattis, said the targets had been chosen to “mitigate the risk of Russian forces being involved.” Dunford said “normal deconfliction channel was used to deconflict airspace” with Moscow, but that the United States did not share with Russia what sites would be targeted.

Neither Washington nor Moscow want to see an escalation of the overall long-running conflict in Syria, say analysts. Trump has already indicated he would like to withdraw the estimated 2,000 U.S. ground troops in northern Syria, where they’ve been assisting Syrian Kurds to defeat Islamic State militants. 

“We’ll be coming out of Syria very soon. Let the other people take of it now,” the U.S. leader said earlier this month.

On a cost-benefit analysis the Kremlin has more to lose from any escalation — or a prolonging of the 7-year-old, multisided Syria conflict now that their longtime ally Assad, thanks to Russian and Iranian military assistance, has swung the battlefield decidedly in his favor and has all but won the civil war. Any major escalation risks reversing the military dynamic, say analysts.

William Gallo contributed to this article.
…

Western warplanes and naval vessels fired a barrage of missiles at three Syrian chemical weapons sites, the opening salvo in what could be a sustained campaign against the government of President Bashar al-Assad and his supporters.

U.S. military officials said the bombardment, a coordinated effort involving both Britain and France, began at 9 p.m. EDT Friday and rained down more than 100 cruise missiles on Syrian facilities in the capital, Damascus, and the city of Homs.

“Right now, this is a one-time shot,” U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told Pentagon reporters late Friday, cautioning more strikes could be in the works.

“That will depend on Mr. Assad, should he decide to use more chemical weapons in the future,” Mattis said.

WATCH: U.S. Defense Secretary Mattis Briefs Reporters in Syria Strikes

The decision to strike, made after consultations between Washington, London and Paris, came after military and intelligence officials concluded the Assad government was indeed responsible for a chemical weapons attack on the town of Douma last Saturday that killed more than 40 people, including women and children, and sickened hundreds more.

​Use of chemical weapons

U.S., British and French officials have expressed a high degree of confidence the attack on Douma by pro-Assad forces used chlorine gas, and that it also likely used another chemical agent, possibly sarin.

Syrian officials have continually denied their forces used chemical weapons. And Russia, which has backed President Assad since before the start of the conflict in Syria, alleged early Friday that the attack was staged by Britain, a charge rejected by both Britain and the United States.

Still, following the strikes, Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. Anatoly Antonov warned the United States, Britain and France would face consequences.

“Our warnings have been left unheard,” Antonov said in a statement posted on Twitter.

“A predesigned scenario is being implemented,” he said. “Insulting the president of Russia is unacceptable and inadmissible.”

WATCH: President Trump Announces Strikes Against Syria

Addressing the American public after ordering the strikes, President Donald Trump said he was compelled to act after witnessing what he described as “the crimes of a monster” in Douma.

“The purpose of our actions tonight is to establish a strong deterrent against the production, spread and use of chemical weapons … a vital national security interest,” Trump said.

“We are prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents,” he added.

​Russian support for Assad

Despite such confidence, other U.S. officials remained wary, warning before the strikes that while Syria’s use of chemical weapons cannot be tolerated, much more is at stake given the backing the Syrian government gets from Moscow.

“This is a chess game and the Russians are ratcheting up the pressure,” a U.S. official told VOA on the condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the situation.

“They’re playing dirty,” the official added. “We need to think two or three steps ahead.”

Complicating any U.S. response is the presence of Russian and Iranian forces on the ground in Syria, one official saying it has “grown and matured” since the United States carried out airstrikes again the Syrian government last April after a sarin gas attack on the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhoun.

​Trump: Russia responsible

In his remarks, Trump said he holds Russia directly responsible for the attack on Douma, saying Moscow failed to live up to its 2013 promise to guarantee Syria eliminated its arsenal of chemical weapons.

“No nation can succeed in the long run by promoting rogue states, brutal tyrants and murderous dictators,” the U.S. president said. “Russia must decide if it will continue down this dark path or if it will join with civilized nations.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May also blamed Russia for thwarting diplomatic efforts to put an end to the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

“There is no practicable alternative to the use of force to degrade and deter the use of chemical weapons,” May said in a statement. “We cannot allow the erosion of the international norm that prevents the use of these weapons.”

Long-term impact of strikes?

While military officials are still assessing the effectiveness of the strikes, there are growing questions about the long-term impact.

“Strategy hasn’t been this administration’s strong suit — Assad and Putin aren’t going to flinch fast and will easily endure military strikes,” Brett Bruen, a former director of global engagement at the White House, told VOA.

“This only works if they can keep up strong diplomatic pressure on Syria, Russia,” he said. “Otherwise, they will worsen our position and the situation on the ground.”

Brian Katulis at the Center for American Progress, is more hopeful.

“This is a very focused strike for one purpose to make sure that countries around the world will not use weapons of mass destruction on a regular basis,” he said. “I think that’s what the president is trying to do and I think he did the right thing.”

U.S. defense officials said Friday they did not consult their Russian counterparts about the strikes, or notify them in advance, though they did use existing lines of communication to de-conflict the airspace to prevent any accidental incidents between U.S. and Russian planes.

​Targeted strikes

Defense officials said the U.S.-led strikes did encounter some initial resistance from Syrian air defense systems, but that it appears Russian defense systems did not engage.

The first target, they said, was a research center involved in the development and production of chemical and biological weapons.

The two other targets, to the west of Homs, Syria, included storage facilities for sarin gas, other chemical weapon precursors and equipment, as well as a key command post.

“We selected these specific targets both based on the significance to the [Syrian] chemical weapons program as well as the location and the layout,” said U.S. Gen. Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “We did not select those that had a high risk of collateral damage and specifically a high risk of civilian casualties.”

Steve Herman at the White House; Katherine Gypson and Aru Pande in Washington.

 
…

The United States, Britain and France, launched military airstrikes in Syria that targeted a scientific research center, a chemical weapons storage facility and another storage facility that also included an important command post.

U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis said the “decisive” efforts were intended to send a “clear message” to the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for its suspected chemical attack against civilians last week and to deter him from doing it again.

Mattis said at a briefing at the Pentagon late Friday that the targets were selected to inflict “long-term degradation” and “maximum damage” to Syria’s stockpile of chemical weapons.

WATCH: U.S. Defense Secretary Mattis Briefs Reporters in Syria Strikes

The defense secretary said he is confident that chlorine was used in the chemical attack in the city of Douma last week that killed at least 40 people and sickened hundreds. He said he was also “not ruling out” the possibility that sarin was also used.

Mattis said the poison gas Assad said he had gotten rid of “still exists.”

The Syrian government has repeatedly denied any use of banned weapons.

General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said more details about the strikes will be available Saturday morning.

Associated Press reporters saw smoke rising from east Damascus and a huge fire could be seen from a distance to the east. Syrian television said the attacks targeted a scientific research center in Barzeh, near Damascus, and an army depot near Homs.

Syrian media reported that air defenses had hit 13 incoming rockets south of Damascus.

WATCH: President Trump Announces Strikes Against Syria

US to sustain pressure

Earlier Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump said the United States was prepared to sustain pressure on Assad until he ended what the president called a criminal pattern of killing his own people with internationally banned chemical weapons.

Trump singled out Syria’s biggest international supporters, Russia and Iran, for failing to stop the Syrian regime’s use of banned chemical weapons.

“Assad’s recent attack and today’s response is a direct result of Russia’s failure to respond,” Trump said.

Congressional support

Congressional leaders are supporting the president’s decision to launch airstrikes in retaliation for an apparent chemical attack against civilians — although there are some reservations.

House Speaker Paul Ryan is praising Trump’s “decisive action in coordination with our allies,” adding, “We are united in our resolve.”

Senate Armed Service Committee Chairman John McCain is applauding the airstrikes but said “they alone will not achieve U.S. objectives in the Middle East.”

Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer is calling the airstrikes appropriate, but said “the administration has to be careful about not getting us into a greater and more involved war in Syria.”

And House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said, “One night of airstrikes is not a substitute for a clear, comprehensive Syria strategy.”

​Not about regime change

British Prime Minister Theresa May said in her country Saturday, according to Reuters, that the attack was “not about intervening in a civil war. It is not about regime change. It is about a limited and targeted strike that does not further escalate tensions in the region and that does everything possible to prevent civilian casualties.”

“We have to remember this is not an attack to institute regime change,” said Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress. “Bombs from the sky is very different than boots on the ground. … This is a very focused strike for one purpose: to make sure that countries around the world will not use weapons of mass destruction on a regular basis. I think that’s what the president is trying to do and I think he did the right thing.”

Steven P. Bucci, a retired Army Special Forces officer and former top Pentagon official who is a visiting fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies, said the strikes may put a dent in Assad’s ability to use chemical weapons against Syrians.

“What may change Assad’s behavior is removing the tools which he’s been using,” Bucci said. “That’s kind of what you have to do. You can’t just stomp your feet and wag your finger. You have to force him to stop.”

Lawrence Corb with the Center for American Progress told VOA that the participation of Britain and France in the strikes may cause Russia to have some “second thoughts” because “the last thing the Russians want is to provide an excuse for the United States and its NATO allies to get involved (in Syria) because (Russia’s) objective is to keep Assad in power.”

Katulis said he does not expect Russia to react to the strikes “as long as Russian soldiers are not harmed in any way” and the attacks are not “close to Russian assets.” He said he thought the U.S. and its allies stopped the strikes “just to make sure” that the U.S. “deconflicted with the Russians, that we communicate our intent very clearly and we didn’t start World War III by accident.”
…

The United States and its European allies on Thursday discussed ways to effectively stop Syria’s government from using chemical weapons to kill rebels and civilians opposed to President Bashar al-Assad. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke has more.
…

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has threatened to arrest an International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor if she conducts activities in his country, arguing it was no longer an ICC member so the court had no right to do any investigating.

Striking out at what he said was an international effort to paint him as a “ruthless and heartless violator of human rights,” Duterte withdrew the Philippines from the ICC’s Rome Statute a month ago and promised to continue his crackdown on drugs, in which thousands have been killed.

ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda in February announced the start of a preliminary examination into a complaint by a Philippine lawyer, which accuses Duterte and top officials of crimes against humanity, and of killing criminals as a policy.

Duterte has cited numerous reasons why he believes the ICC has no jurisdiction over him, and on Friday suggested that any doubts about that should have been dispelled by his withdrawal.

“What is your authority now? If we are not members of the treaty, why are you … in this country?” he told reporters, in comments aimed at Bensouda. “You cannot exercise any proceedings here without basis. That is illegal and I will arrest you.”

It is not clear whether Bensouda or the ICC has carried out any activities in the Philippines related to the complaint against Duterte. The office of the prosecutor in The Hague and the Philippine foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Drug war toll

Police have since July 2016 killed more than 4,000 people they say are drug dealers who resisted arrest. Activists say many of those were executions, which police deny.

Duterte has told security forces not to cooperate with any foreign investigators and last month said he would convince other ICC members to withdraw.

Duterte had earlier vowed to face the ICC and critics say pulling out is futile, because the ICC has jurisdiction to investigate alleged crimes committed in the period from when the Philippines joined in 2011 to when its withdrawal takes effect in March 2019.

Legal technicality

Under the Rome Statute, the ICC can step in and exercise jurisdiction if states are unable or unwilling to investigate suspected crimes.

But the mercurial former mayor and his legal aides argue that technically, the Philippines never joined the ICC, because it was not announced in the country’s official gazette.

“If there is no publication, it is as if there is no law at all,” Duterte said Friday.
…

Ukraine this week dismissed as unacceptable a natural gas transit proposal by Russian energy giant Gazprom. Kyiv’s move will further complicate efforts by Western European governments to persuade their Central European counterparts to withdraw objections to Nord Stream 2, a Kremlin-favored pipeline being built under the Baltic Sea to deliver gas from Russia to Germany without transiting Ukraine and Poland.

The politics of Nord Stream 2 have become increasingly tangled amid heightened tensions between Europe and Russia. Suspicions are growing that the Kremlin wants to develop the new pipeline to reduce the importance of the one running through Ukraine — more for political reasons than commercial ones.

On Monday, Ukrainian leader Petro Poroshenko dubbed Russia “an extremely unreliable partner” in energy provision. In an interview with a German newspaper, he also said Nord Stream 2 would provide the Kremlin with the opportunity to switch off at will the gas to Ukraine without disrupting supplies to Western Europe. Most of the natural gas Western Europe buys from Russia currently flows through Ukraine.

Nord Stream 2 would replace an older pipeline under the Baltic Sea, and double by next year the amount of Russian gas delivered to Germany, the European Union’s most powerful economy.

German authorities have dismissed in the past Ukrainian and Polish objections to Nord Stream 2, and last month they issued the final permits needed for pipeline construction on German territory and in its territorial waters. Finland also has issued construction permits. 

​Merkel’s stance

But after weeks of lobbying by Kyiv, and with growing pressure from within Germany’s newly formed governing coalition, Chancellor Angela Merkel has started to harden her language about the proposed pipeline. It will cost billions of dollars to build and is planned to run 1,200 kilometers from Vyborg in Russia to Lubmin in Germany.

Russia currently supplies more than one-third of the natural gas Europe uses, though with demand increasing that could reach closer to 50 percent next decade.

In the past, Merkel hasn’t acknowledged a geopolitical dimension when it comes to debating the benefits and drawbacks of Nord Stream 2. She brushed away Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki’s objections at a Berlin press conference in February. He warned of the dangers of Europe becoming too dependent on Russian energy and said Russia must “not be allowed to have a monopoly and force its prices on the European Union” or use the gas to blackmail EU governments.

But after a meeting Tuesday with Poroshenko, Merkel acknowledged for the first time allies’ concerns over the “political” and “strategic” aspects of the proposed pipeline, saying Nord Stream 2 could proceed only if Ukraine’s role as a transit country for Russian gas also was protected.

She said the earnings Ukraine receives for gas transit rights are of strategic importance. “That is why I have made it very clear that the Nord Stream 2 project is not possible without clarity regarding the transit role of Ukraine,” she said.

Ukraine and Poland aren’t the only European countries objecting to Nord Stream 2. Baltic nations and Slovakia, as well as Sweden and Denmark, have expressed doubts about the project, both out of solidarity with Ukraine, which would lose about $3 billion a year in revenue once the new pipeline was complete, and over fears about Europe’s growing dependence on natural gas supplies from Russia.

That dependency, they fear, could make Europe vulnerable to geopolitical blackmail by Russia. It is a view shared by the U.S., which has urged Germany to be cautious about signing up to Nord Stream 2 and has promised to offer more U.S. gas to Europe.

​Pipeline critics

NATO’s former head, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, has described Nord Stream 2 as a “geopolitical mistake” for the EU, saying it would make a mockery of EU sanctions on Russia for its annexation of Crimea.

Last week, the Trump administration included Alexei Miller, the CEO of Gazprom, which is 50 percent owned by the Russian state, on an expanded economic sanctions list.

On Tuesday, Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics said that the Baltic states, Nordic countries and Visegrad countries had formed a bloc on Nord Stream 2 inside the EU. “We have always been united in our position regarding Nord Stream 2, and we believe that this is not an economic and business but a political project,” he said.

Authorities in Sweden and Denmark are still mulling whether to agree to construction permits. Last year, Denmark’s parliament passed legislation that would allow the Danish government to ban the pipeline from going through the country’s territorial waters.

Gazprom said in March that it would terminate its gas contracts with Ukraine after a European court ordered the Russian giant to pay more than $2.5 billion to Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz, concluding a long legal battle about prices and obligations.

Gazprom transit

But in a statement this week seemingly aimed at assuaging European doubts about the project, Miller, the Gazprom CEO, said his company had never envisaged stopping all transit through Ukraine and would maintain volumes of 10 billion to 15 billion cubic meters per year.

Ukrainian Energy Minister Igor Nasalyk said Wednesday that those amounts were too small to make Russian gas transit economically viable. “Our country will not accept such volumes,” he said.

Ukrainian energy officials say Russia needs to pump at least 40 billion cubic meters of gas per year to make the transit route through Ukraine “economically profitable” for Kyiv. Last year, 93.5 billion cubic meters of Russian gas transited Ukraine to the rest of Europe — about half of the EU bloc’s total purchases from Gazprom.

Merkel’s shift in language about Nord Stream 2 followed a series of highly critical remarks about Russia from Heiko Maas, Germany’s new foreign minister. Ukraine argues the whole project is political, and Poroshenko said this week that his country’s transit pipeline could be modernized more cheaply than the cost of building Nord Stream 2.

Russian officials counter that it is European foes who are trying to turn natural gas into a political weapon by throwing up objections to the new pipeline project. They also contend that Europe will face gas shortages and price spikes next decade if the Russian energy giant isn’t allowed to boost capacity. 
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Amnesty International reports the number of executions around the world continued to fall last year, with a 4 percent drop in executions and a significant decline in the number of new death sentences.

In an annual report on executions and the death penalty released on Thursday, the human rights organization said there were at least 993 executions in 23 countries last year, down 4 percent from 1,032 in 2016 and down 39 percent from 1,634 in 2015.

The vast majority of global executions recorded last year took place in China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Pakistan, according to the report.

China

China remained the world’s top executioner, the rights group said. Though the precise number of executions in China remains unknown, Amnesty said “thousands of executions [are] believed to have been carried out” in the country last year.

Four countries — Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Pakistan — accounted for 84 percent of the reported executions. Iran had at least 507 executions, Saudi Arabia at least 146, Iraq at least 125 and Pakistan at least 60, Amnesty said.

Five other countries — Botswana, Indonesia, Nigeria, Sudan and Taiwan reported no executions.

Amnesty International said the drop in executions was driven by growing aversion to the death penalty around the world, in particular in sub-Saharan Africa where 20 countries have abolished the practice and others are taking steps to repeal it.

“Developments across sub-Saharan Africa in 2017 exemplified the positive trend recorded globally, with Amnesty International’s research pointing to a further decrease in the global use of the death penalty in 2017,” said the report.

USA

In the United States, the only Western country with the death penalty, there were 23 executions and 42 death sentences. Though slightly higher than 2016, both figures are in line with historically low trends seen in recent years, Amnesty said.

In Europe and Central Asia, Belarus was the only country to execute people, with at least two executions and at least four death sentences, Amnesty said.

The global trend toward abolishing the death penalty continued.

Executions eliminated

Guinea and Mongolia expunged the death penalty for all crimes. Guinea became the 20th sub-Saharan country to abolish the punishment for all crimes. Kenya ended mandatory death penalty for murder while Burkina Faso and Chad took steps to repeal the practice.

“The progress in sub-Saharan Africa reinforced its position as a beacon of hope for abolition,” Amnesty International’s Secretary-General Salil Shetty said in a statement. “The leadership of countries in this region gives fresh hope that the abolition of the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment is within reach.”

At the end of 2017, 106 countries had abolished the death penalty in law for all crimes and 142 countries had abolished the death penalty in law or practice, according to Amnesty.
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Kensington Palace has announced that politicians and world leaders won’t be attending Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding. But 1,200 members of the public — many involved with charities or community groups — have been invited to the grounds of Windsor Castle for the May 19 celebration. That will give them a chance to see the royals arrive at the chapel and to see the carriage procession after the wedding ceremony.

Here’s a look at some of the people invited:

• Pamela Anomneze, 52, who works with 306 Collective in London, which helps people with mental health issues by teaching them to create mugs, jewelry, textiles and other items.

• Catherine Cooke, 53, and her daughter Julie-Ann Coll, 35, of Northern Ireland. Cooke was chosen for her involvement with a network of women’s groups across the country and Coll for her work with Life After Loss, a child bereavement support group she joined after her 22-week-old son died.

• Kai Fletcher, 18, who was homeless at 15 and now works with a charity called Southside in the English city of Bath.

• Jorja Furze, 12, who was born with only one leg and is an ambassador for Steel Bones, a charity in England that supports civilian amputees.

​- Phillip Gillespie, 30, a former soldier from Northern Ireland who lost his right leg in a combat incident in Afghanistan, where Harry also served.

• David Gregory, 28, a teacher in northeastern England who is a driving force behind efforts to get students more engaged with science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

• Reuben Litherland, 14, who was born deaf and has started giving sign language lessons at his school in England.

• Amelia Thompson, 12, who was caught up in the suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester that killed 22 people last year. As her guest she’s taking Sharon Goodman, the grandmother of 15-year-old Olivia Campbell-Hardy, who died in the attack.

• Amy Wright, 26, from Scotland, chairwoman of the board of directors for The Usual Place, a cafe that provides training opportunities for young adults who need support.

 
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Four laboratories linked to the international chemical weapons watchdog have confirmed Britain’s findings that a nerve agent was used last month to poison a former Russian spy and his daughter.

The confirmations were in an Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) report released Thursday.

British Ambassador to the U.N. Karen Pierce said OPCW’s conclusions “agree explicitly with the U.K.’s analysis” and added the chemical used in the attack was a “military-grade nerve agent of high purity.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May said former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were poisoned last month in Salisbury, England with a military-grade nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union in the 1970s and ’80s.

The watchdog did not blame Russia for the attack nor did it name the specific chemical agent used.  But British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said only Russia had the “means, motive, and record” to carry out such an attack.

Russia has denied involvement in the attack and contends Britain has not provided evidence to support its allegation.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday Russia would not accept any of the report’s conclusions unless Russian officials were provided access to the ongoing investigation. Zakharova also accused Britain of waging a campaign to discredit Russia.

“We are all simply drowning in a torrent of misinformation that is in one way or another supported by official London,” she told reporters. “There are no grounds to believe that all of this is not the continuation of a crude provocation against the Russian Federation on the part of the British special services.”

Britain, meanwhile, has called on the U.N. Security Council to convene a meeting to discuss the report, according to a tweet from Britain’s mission to the United Nations.

Ambassador Pierce said it would probably be held next Wednesday.

Yulia Skripal was discharged Monday from a British hospital. She said she was still suffering from the effects of the poisoning and her father remains seriously ill.  

She lives in Russia but was visiting her father in Britain when they were poisoned. In a statement issued Wednesday night by Britain’s Metropolitan Police Service that was attributed to her, she rejected an offer of assistance from the Russian Embassy. Zakharova reiterated that British officials were keeping Yulia Skripal in isolation and said Moscow would continue to demand access to her.

 
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America’s allies are offering to join a possible military response to a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad. But they’re urging Washington to avoid swift retaliation, saying that before a reprisal is launched, more evidence is needed that Syria was behind the chemical attack.

In very direct terms, U.S. President Donald Trump warned on Twitter Wednesday that a military response was coming:

Russian officials were quick to respond, saying if there was an American strike, then Russia would shoot down the missiles and target the positions from where they were launched.

“Smart missiles should fly toward terrorists, not the legal government that has been fighting international terrorism for several years on its territory,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova remarked in a Facebook post.

Amid the heated social media exchange with threats and counterwarnings, all raising the stakes of a military confrontation between the U.S. and Russia, Britain, France and Australia offered backing for a U.S. missile strike, but they weighted their backing with caveats.

And they questioned the deterrent effect of missile strikes, pointing out that U.S. military retaliation a year ago in response to a Syrian government sarin gas attack on Khan Sheikhoun in the northern Syrian province of Idlib had failed to stop Assad from launching other chemical attacks, predominantly with chlorine barrel bombs dropped from regime helicopters.

In a phone conversation with Trump late Tuesday, British Prime Minister Theresa May offered her support but, according to British officials, said Britain would need more evidence of who was behind the suspected chemical attack on Saturday on a rebel-held Damascus suburb. The attack left at least 40 people dead and up to 500 injured.

With inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) preparing to visit the suburb of Douma, the site of the attack, other Western allies said there should be no action until more facts were established.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron has said France is ready to commit to punitive action, if it is confirmed that Assad crossed a red line and used chemical weapons. But he appears to want to limit retaliatory strikes to Syrian government chemical weapons facilities.

With the U.S. and its Western allies telegraphing a possible military response, analysts say they have lost the element of surprise and given the Syrian government and its military backers Russia and Iran plenty of time to get ready for an attack.

“The obvious pitfall for this likely U.S.-France-U.K. strike on Assad is that the effect of surprise is totally lost but also has given enough time for the Syrian regime, Russia and Iran to get prepared with anti-aircraft batteries and to empty potential targets,” said Olivier Guitta, managing director at GlobalStrat, a security and geopolitical risk consultancy.

He said the situation now was different from 2013 when Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, threatened to strike at Assad for a chemical attack, also on rebels and civilians in a Damascus suburb.

“Then the repercussions would have been much less in terms of actors because Iran and Russia were barely present in Syria,” he said. “While a strike on Assad is more than overdue since 2013, there’s a risk of conflagration, escalation and the first actual fighting between Russia and the West, opening the door to a longer, protracted conflict,” he warned.

That fear also appeared to be weighing on the minds of European governments allied with the U.S., including among members of May’s ruling Conservative Party in Britain, who worry that the Trump administration has no overall strategy for Syria.

“There are worries about being involved in any military action,” said David Amess, a British lawmaker. “Given the disastrous consequences of our involvement in Iraq, we need a strategy. We need it clearly laid out to parliament, what our objectives are. This is not a straightforward issue and we need to wait for the reports from the OPCW. This is a very dangerous and worrying time.”

Like other senior Conservative lawmakers, he said the prime minister would have no option but to seek parliamentary approval before ordering any strike on Syria. Julian Lewis, chairman of the British Parliament’s defense committee, said Tuesday: “When we are contemplating military intervention in other people’s conflicts, Parliament ought to be consulted first.”

That raises the prospect of a repeat of the setback suffered by May’s predecessor in Downing Street, David Cameron, who sought Parliament’s agreement in 2013 to participate in a U.S.-led military strike on Syria, only to lose the vote. The withholding of British support contributed to Obama’s decision to stay his hand and not to enforce his “red line” on the use of chemical weapons by the Assad government.

British officials said Trump had not formally asked May to participate in military action. They also said there were no immediate plans to recall the House of Commons, which is currently in recess. But May has called for a meeting Thursday of her “war cabinet,” prompting concern among opposition leaders that she might commit to some joint action without seeking parliamentary approval first.

In a statement after May’s conversation with the U.S. leader, Downing Street said the two had agreed that the international community had to respond, but they stopped short of blaming the Syrian government, which denies being behind the Douma attack. That contrasted with the tone of U.S. officials, who have been clear in pointing the finger at Assad.

The former head of British armed forces, Lord Richard Dannatt, said that if the U.S and Britain did take action, it shouldn’t be restricted to an isolated retaliatory strike, which, he said, on its own would be meaningless. 

A reprisal, he said, has to be done within a “broader strategy.” He said an isolated “missile strike like the one Donald Trump ordered last year wouldn’t achieve anything, and that didn’t achieve anything.”

Dannatt dismissed various and shifting Russian explanations for the attack, including Kremlin claims that the White Helmets, a first-response volunteer organization operating in parts of rebel-controlled Syria, could have faked the attack. “The Russians have developed fake news into an art form,” he said.

“Up to this moment, it has seemed much more than likely, and high on the balance of probabilities, that this was an attack using chemical weapons carried out by the Syrian regime. … And it is right that they don’t get away with it,” he said.
…

When the U.S. fired Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airfield a year ago after a chemical weapons attack, the Pentagon gave Moscow advance warning to get its personnel out of harm’s way.

Since then, U.S.-Russian relations have soured, and the two nuclear powers have raised the ante, getting dangerously close to a potential military clash in Syria.

U.S. President Donald Trump has taunted Moscow to “get ready” for “nice and new and ‘smart”‘ missiles coming to punish Syria for a purported chemical attack on Saturday that killed at least 40 people. The tweet followed Russia’s warning that it will strike at incoming U.S. missiles and their launch platforms.

The defiant posture leaves both the White House and the Kremlin with fewer options to respond without losing face.

A stern statement last month by Russia’s top military officer effectively drew a red line on any U.S. strike. Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the Russian military’s General Staff, said Russian military officers are at Syrian facilities throughout the country and warned that “if a threat to our servicemen emerges, the Russian armed forces will take retaliatory measures against both missiles and their carriers.”

Some say the U.S. could launch a limited strike like it did in April 2017, when it hit Syria’s Shayrat airfield with cruise missiles after warning Russia. Such a scenario would allow Washington to claim it made good on its promise to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad without triggering a clash with Russia.

A pinpoint U.S. strike on Syrian targets that does not harm Russian personnel “will allow Trump to say that the Assad regime has paid a heavy price … and Russia, in its turn, will be able to limit itself to ringing statements,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, the head of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policies, an association of top Russian political and security experts.

He added, however, that the U.S. would be unlikely to warn Russia of the coming strike this time.

“The context of the relations has changed radically in the past year: We’re in a state of a real and tangible Cold War,” Lukyanov said.

Cooling relations

Moscow’s hopes of warmer ties with Washington under Trump have been shattered by the ongoing U.S. investigations of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election and its potential ties with the Trump campaign. The Trump administration has ramped up sanctions against Russia and expelled dozens of diplomats. Tensions between the two countries have escalated on a broad range of issues — from the crisis in Ukraine to the war in Syria to the poisoning of an ex-Russian spy in Britain, which triggered the massive diplomatic war.

President Vladimir Putin’s top adviser, Vladislav Surkov, said in an article released earlier this week that Russia has abandoned its centuries-long aspirations of integrating into the West and is bracing for a new era of “geopolitical loneliness.” Surkov warned that “it’s going to be tough,” but added cryptically that “it’ll be fun.”

Opinions vary about what may happen in Syria.

“The situation is pretty bad, but it shouldn’t be overdramatized,” Alexei Malashenko, a leading Russian expert on Syria said in televised remarks. “I don’t believe that a clash between Russia and the U.S. is possible.”

Washington and Moscow both have said that a hotline established in 2015 to prevent incidents between their militaries in Syria has worked well, but the rising stakes make the situation more unstable than ever during the Syrian conflict.

Possible scenarios

Under one possible scenario, Russia may try to use its sophisticated electronic warfare systems deployed in Syria to make U.S. missiles veer off course without shooting them down. If that softer option doesn’t work, the Russian military could use an array of its state-of-the-art air defense assets in Syria to target the U.S. cruise missiles or drones.

Vyacheslav Nikonov, a senior lawmaker in the Kremlin-controlled lower house of parliament, said in televised remarks that the Russian military was getting its electronic countermeasures and air defense assets ready for action. He added on a combative note that the situation offers a “good chance to test them in conditions of real combat.”

An even more threatening situation may evolve if the U.S. and its allies use manned aircraft, and the Russian strike results in casualties.

Such a scenario could trigger a quick escalation, leaving Russia and the U.S. on the brink of a full-scale conflict — a situation unseen even during the darkest moments of the Cold War.

Retired Lt. Gen. Yevgeny Buzhinsky, the former chief of the Russian Defense Ministry’s international department, warned that Russia has thousands of military advisers in Syria “practically in every battalion,” and a strike on any Syrian facility could jeopardize their lives. He warned that Russia and the U.S. will quickly find themselves in a major conflict if they allow a collision in Syria to happen.

“I have an impression that Americans’ survival instincts have grown numb, if not vanished completely,” Buzhinsky said. “They seem not to really believe that Russia will give a tough military response and expect some sort of a local brawl, exchanging some minor blows. It’s a miscalculation. Any clash between Russian and U.S. militaries will expand beyond a local conflict and an escalation will be inevitable.”

Fears of war

Andrei Klimov, the head of an upper house committee that investigates foreign meddling in Russian affairs, proudly said on the top talk show on Russian state TV that his relative, a Soviet pilot, won a medal for combat duty in Vietnam. Klimov pointed to heavy U.S. losses from Soviet missiles and jets in Vietnam, adding that Russia stands ready to counter any possible U.S. strike.

Unlike the Vietnam War, where Soviet advisers helping North Vietnam supposedly weren’t directly engaged in combat, the potential clash in Syria would pit Russia directly against the U.S.

Fears of war swept Russian newspaper headlines and TV news, with commentators discussing the darkest possible outcomes, including a nuclear war.

“What if the war starts tomorrow?” the front page of Moskovsky Komsomolets clamored on Wednesday. Russia’s best-selling newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda wondered: “Is macho Trump going to start World War III?”

Even former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev weighed in. The 87-year-old former president compared the tensions to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and said he feels “great concern.”
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