Syria
Saturday 23 September 2017
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Sergey Kislyak
Former Russian Ambassador to the U.S.
“I have worked for years in the American (relations) field, and I can responsibly say that we did everything, simply everything, to maintain normal cooperation.”
Read more...Russia’s own actions endangering global security caused the deterioration of relations with the United States as well as with other countries. The conditions for lifting sanctions and returning to “normal” cooperation have been clearly presented to Russia but Moscow ignores its obligation to help maintain global security. -
Russian Embassy to the United Kingdom
“The civil war is over, that is between the Syrians. But foreign jihadists, who invaded Syria in 2012, still have to be defeated.”
Read more...Russia’s embassy to the United Kingdom claims that the Syrian civil war is over. So why do regime attacks on rebel-held areas continue? -
Russian Foreign Ministry
“The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has confirmed that Syria’s chemical arsenal was completely destroyed under international supervision.”
Read more...The OPCW, tasked with overseeing the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles, has stated it can only confirm the elimination of materials declared by the Syrian government. It has growing suspicions, in the words of the director, that Damascus may have hidden 'some chemical weapons," in light of corroborated reports of their use by Syrian forces. -
Russkaya Vesna
pro-Kremlin news site supporting the Russia-backed separatists in Ukaine
"US intelligence services have achieved the removal of Russian Tempbank from SWIFT [the international financial information exchange]."
Read more...While the U.S. government has placed sanctions on Tempbank over its dealings with Syria, Washington does not have the power to remove banks from SWIFT. -
RT
Russian government-funded international broadcaster
“In an effort to compete with more technologically advanced forces, the U.S. Army is investing in new programs to develop autonomous drones and create a network of battlefield devices that communicate with each other… The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) released a report that found the US Army has fallen behind other technologically advanced states after spending nearly two decades fighting technologically inferior adversaries in the Middle East.”
Read more...The U.S. Army actually enjoys “an overall qualitative advantage” over all of its counterparts, including Russia, despite a narrowing gap in capabilities -
Ramzan Kadyrov
Head of Chechnya
“America is carrying out policies against Russia, against the nation’s leadership. They know I am one of those ready to give my life for Russia, and that I have a good army capable of attacking and defending. We will see who comes out on top.”
Read more...Chechnya’s Kremlin-appointed head threatened the U.S. with his “army.” His claims are baseless: by military standards, Chechnya has no army. -
Vladimir Putin
Russian President
“Those are [IS] militants” [Vladimir Putin] “You wouldn’t want to join [IS] if you saw that” [Oliver Stone].
Read more...While Putin evidently believed the video was taken from recent Russian air strikes in Syria, in fact, it is a clip evidently of U.S. air strikes in Afghanistan released in 2009. -
Maria Zakharova
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson
“There has been a real substitution of information. The CNN report was aimed at manipulating public opinion.”
Read more...It is unclear why Zakharova singled out CNN for criticism when Daqneesh’s story had been widely covered by international media. The timing of her comments, several weeks after the boy reappeared, may well be more to do with a scandal at CNN. -
Russian Defense Ministry
unidentified 'source'
“The Israelis simply struck the site from which the shelling had been carried out. As a result of this air strike, two of the terrorists’ tanks and a heavy machine gun were destroyed.”
Read more...Russian state media have cited claims from the Ministry of Defense that the Israeli Air Force bombed Islamist militants rather than Syrian regime forces. Unfortunately, Syrian state television had already reported that Israel had bombed their positions. -
Gen. Sergei Surovikin
Commander of Russian forces in Syria
"Instead of eliminating terrorists guilty of killing hundreds and thousands of Syrian civilians, the U.S.-led coalition together with the Democratic Forces Union [Syrian Democratic Forces] controlled by it, enters into collusion with ringleaders of the ISIL, who give up the settlements they had seized without fighting and head to the provinces where the Syrian government forces are active."
Read more...The commander of Russian forces in Syria said the U.S.-led coalition and the Syrian Democratic Forces have entered “into collusion” with Islamic State “ringleaders” and given them safe passage “south of Raqqah,” and that IS left the city “without fighting.” However, the territory south of Raqqah is controlled by IS, which means they do not need a safe corridor to travel there, while IS is reportedly fighting U.S.-backed forces for every street inside the city. -
Vladimir Putin
President, Russia
“We are aware of the accusations of the use of chemical weapons. There is no proof whatsoever! We offered right after it happened to conduct an inspection exactly at the airport from where President Assad’s aircraft allegedly took off with chemical weapons. They refused – nobody wants that. …because they were afraid that this falsification would be exposed – it’s as simple as that. Regarding the people who were killed or suffered from the use of weapons, including chemical weapons – that is false information.”
Read more...Vladimir Putin said the United States and its allies refused to investigate chemical attacks that took place in Syria in April because they feared the probe would reveal that the attacks were “falsified” and there was no proof the regime of Bashar al-Assad possesses and has used chemical weapons. Putin also claimed that reports about the victims of such attacks is “false information.” However, France, Turkey and the Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons have each conducted an independent investigation and produced detailed reports showing the Assad regime carried out sarin gas attacks. -
Leonid Slutsky
Chairman of the Russian State Duma’s Foreign Relations Committee
“While Russia is making enormous efforts to support the reconciliation process in Syria, the United States, with its actions, is weakening the position of forces carrying out the fight against Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra (terrorist organizations banned in the Russian Federation) and actually ‘playing into the hands’ of those terrorist groups.”
Read more...A prominent member of Russia’s parliament said the U.S. was “playing into the hands” of Islamic State and other terrorists by launching an airstrike against forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The U.S. strike was in fact part of an effort to stop repeated violations of the deconfliction zone by Syrian government forces that have endangered the lives of American troops.