Syria: Arab League refuses to withdraw observer mission
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Qatar, the Arab power most critical of Damascus, has privately pushed for a greater UN role within the monitoring mission. But foreign ministers on the League's Syria steering committee, which met in Cairo yesterday, ruled out giving the mission an international dimension by inviting UN experts to join it.
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Mr Assad's government, which received a second boost yesterday after a large Russian naval flotilla, led by an aircraft carrier, docked in the Syrian port of Tartus yesterday.
Syrian state media trumpeted the mission as evidence of Russia's commitment to its ally. "The port call is aimed at bringing the two countries closer together and strengthening their ties of friendship," the Syrian news agency SANA quoted Vladimir Yakushin, a Russian naval officer, as saying.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/9001114/Syria-Arab-League-refuses-to-withdraw-observer-mission.html