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Conflict in Syria

Putin calls US strikes against Syria 'aggression against sovereign country'

Vladimir Putin believes the US strike against Syria is an attempt to distract attention from numerous civilian casualties during operations in Iraq

© Alexey Nikolsky/Presidential press service/TASS

MOSCOW, April 7. /TASS/. The US missile strike against Syria’s facilities was an act of aggression and impairs both Russian-US relations and the key goal of fighting international terrorism, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Friday citing the opinion of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

President Putin considers the US strikes against Syria an act of aggression against a sovereign country violating the norms of international law, and under a trumped-up pretext at that," Peskov stressed. He noted that the Syrian army has no stockpiles of chemical weapons. "The fact that all Syrian armed forces’ chemical weapons stockpiles were eliminated was registered and confirmed by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), a specialized UN unit," he highlighted.

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Homs governor slams US missile strikes as ‘serving terrorists’ goals’

"Putin believes that the total disregard for the use of chemical weapons by terrorists only exacerbates the situation significantly," Peskov went on to say. "Putin also sees the strikes on Syria by the US as an attempt to divert the attention of the international community from numerous civilian casualties in Iraq."

"Washington’s move substantially impairs Russian-US relations, which are in a deplorable state as it is," Peskov emphasized.

"And, most importantly, Putin believes that this step does not bring us closer to the ultimate goal in the fight against international terrorism. On the contrary, it creates serious obstacles to efforts in forging an international coalition to fight against it and effectively counter this global evil. By the way, US President Donald Trump proclaimed this as one of the key objectives during his election campaign," the Kremlin spokesman explained.

The US military fired at least 50 cruise missiles at a military base of the Syrian government forces in the Homs province last night. The missile strike comes in response to what Washington believes was the Syrian government’s use of banned chemical weapons in the province of Idlib. The Tomahawk cruise missiles were intended for a single target - an airfield in the Homs province from which, according to the US intelligence data, the alleged chemical attack was launched.

US President Donald Trump confirmed that he had given the order to carry out the strike.

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Foreign policy Syrian conflict

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