Russia says no country can use military force in Syria without government approval

[MowCowWhoHow III]

Source: Reuters

Russia's deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Friday that no country could use military force in Syria without first securing the agreement of the Syrian government, the TASS news agency reported.

TASS said Ryabkov was responding to a question about the prospect of the United States launching a ground operation in Syria.

"The question of using military force in any form without the agreement of Damascus is for us unacceptable," it quoted him as saying.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/30/us-mideast-crisis-russia-warning-idUSKCN0SO0U120151030?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&utm_source=twitter

[MynameisBlarney]

1. Seriously?

That sounds like a load of bullshit.

[Munificence]

21. You mean

you think it would be perfectly acceptable for let's say "China" to parachute into teabag land here in the U.S and assassinate a few "muricans" without the approval of our government?

[MynameisBlarney]

25. Not really a good analogy

But I kinda think I maybe get where you're coming.

[geek tragedy]

2. Had they not invaded Ukraine and Georgia, this would be semi-credible nt

[riversedge]

4. umm. maybe putin has plans to rule Syria???

[TwilightGardener]

5. And...so? If Assad welcomes Russia, what is that to us?

[Adrahil]

24. No kidding.

And the Putin boot lickers will ignore it.

[TwilightGardener]

3. They're right, Syria is a sovereign country with a legitimate leader.

But no one cares about that, we've been conducting airstrikes for a year now. The real question is: what is the United States' interest in Syria that we need to have a ground operation, when Russia and Iran also have ground operations going? Prez O. needs to come out and explain why it's necessary to send ground troops NOW. Not last year, not 6 months ago--why NOW? Edit to add: we won't get a real reason. He's running a secret little shadow war, the purpose of which we can't know. Notice the neocons and GOPers are quiet--they love it.

[geek tragedy]

6. how do you figure Assad is 'legitimate?' nt

[TwilightGardener]

7. Pretty sure he's recognized as the President or whatever of Syria.

Is he a bad guy? Yeah. Does he deserve legitimacy? No. But there he is.

[geek tragedy]

8. He's the official, de jure sovereign. "Legitimate" is a much different concept, pertaining

to the consent of the ruled.

Dictators can be legitimate--Putin is a fascist thug, but the Russian people seem to dig that. Assad, not so much.

[TwilightGardener]

9. I doubt there's an accurate way to tell how much real approval any of these dictator types have--

Putin is heading toward Kim Jong Un territory in popularity polls, pretty soon he'll be at 102%.

[geek tragedy]

10. There's no scientific way, but not all authoritarians are created equal nt

[bemildred]

12. Here:

---

According to some reports, most of these fighters are not even Syrian nationals. They have been channeled into Syria via the Turkish and Jordanian borders by outside interests. Even Malaysians have been arrested, carrying the US-supplied weapons inside Syrian territory. According to some Malaysian officials, about 100 Malaysian nationals are currently fighting against Assad’s forces In Syria.

The US’ notorious $500 million train and equip program and an overwhelming presence of foreign-funded fighters in Syria are enough to debunk the myth of a real “civil” war in Syria. The simple fact is that this is a war that’s been imposed on Syria. It has virtually no popular basis. This is evident from the fact that according to the UN, nearly 80% of the Syrian population is living in territory currently held by the Syrian government. What else could one demand as a “proof” of Assad’s legitimacy?

One might argue that people flee from territories under Islamist forces’ control to avoid persecution but then fall a prey to the Syrian Army. They may face persecution in the form of Syrian Army investigations of their whereabouts and political affiliations. Notwithstanding this argument, the fact that people seem to willingly live and prefer the territory under the Syrian Army’s control provides equally strong evidence and a counter-narrative to the western-sponsored myth of popular “civil” war.

Why Syrian people are fleeing from the territories under the control of Islamists is evident from a recently published report by Amnesty International, which claimed that fighters from militias have not only been forcing people out of their homes, but also burning them and sometimes razing whole villages.

http://atimes.com/2015/10/war-without-end-syrian-slaughter-continues-as-us-and-russia-contend/

[geek tragedy]

13. I don't think the illegitimacy of one side bestows legitimacy on the other.

Plenty of Iranian and Lebanese, and now Russians, fighting for Team Assad as well.

An international abattoir.

[bemildred]

14. Have another:

Everything You Needed to Know About Syria in 8 Minutes

---

Wolf Blitzer, Host of CNN, The Situation Room (10/21/15): Let’s talk about this deal, this agreement worked out between US and Russia to avoid some accidental head on collision with fighter jets over Syria. The secrecy of this deal, without making it public, does that concern you?

Congresswoman and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Hawaii, Armed Services Committee: It doesn’t. I think that the Pentagon knows how important it is to make sure that our troops are not put into harm’s way and are not put into a position where you have this accidental military conflict with Russia in the air. So I think that making this deal with Russia to de-conflict that is an important thing. But there is a bigger issue here that I am concerned with and that is the fact that the US and the CIA are working to overthrow the Syrian government of Assad while Russia a longtime ally of decades now is working to defend or uphold this government of Assad. And this puts us in a position of possible direct head to head conflict with Russia as long as the US and Russia continue down this path.Blitzer: Well how does the US and Russia avoid that head on conflict because, you are absolutely right, the US wants to get rid of Bashar Assad and Russia wants to boost them and to protect them together with the Iranians, their allies, the Lebanese Hezbollah group, they are trying to prop him (Assad) up. So how do you avoid that potential collision?

Blitzer: Well how does the US and Russia avoid that head on conflict because, you are absolutely right, the US wants to get rid of Bashar Assad and Russia wants to boost them and to protect them together with the Iranians, their allies, the Lebanese Hezbollah group, they are trying to prop him (Assad) up. So how do you avoid that potential collision?

Gabbard: Very Simple. The US and the CIA should stop this illegal and counterproductive war to overthrow the Syrian government of Assad and should stay focused on fighting against who are enemy is, the Islamic extremist groups. Because right now we are seeing why this is counterproductive, by working towards that end, by working towards the overthrowing of the Syrian government of Assad, we are not only strengthening our enemy, these Islamic extremists who will walk in and take over all of Syria. Right now, they have about half of the country under their control. But it also puts us in that position of a potential head to head conflict with Russia, which brings us to the brink of a larger conflict, a WWIII type of situation.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/30/everything-you-needed-to-know-about-syria-in-8-minutes/

I know it is the dreaded Mike Whitney and Counterpunch, but I doubt they have altered what Ms Gabbard has to say.

[geek tragedy]

15. I think that's largely right, but there's a difference between "Assad has no legitimacy" and "we

ought to do everything possible to overthrow him."

[bemildred]

16. I am not a fan of Assad, but he needs to be negotiated out in an orderly fashion.

We don't need to repeat Bremer's Folly. We have an excellent chance to do exactly that, now, and ought to get with the program.

I am actually OK with the Special Ops guys going in, I think, I expect they are spotters and such for the Raqqa offensive we want to do. But we need to get over our high dudgeon and whining offensive and start taking care of business diplomatically, or it is not going to work out well.

The point about Assad is that he has as much legitimacy as anybody, and he has a functional government, and he is totally at the disposal of Iran and Russia at this point.

[geek tragedy]

17. I can't disagree with anything you've written.

Sometimes the lesser of two evils is not very lesser.

[bemildred]

18. Thank you. nt

[David__77]

20. I do think that UN would consider Syria sovereign and Assad the legitimate president of Syria.

I understand "legitimate" to mean lawful or in accordance with established rules, which is a positive and not normative concept (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/legitimate?s=ts). Others aside from the UN may disagree with the lawfulness of Assad's presidency.

Some may also not see the state of the Syrian Arab Republic as having sovereignty over the territory of that state. I do not think that the Syrian Arab Republic has effective control over much of the territory of that state - it has lost sovereignty over that territory, in that sense.

My sense is that a sort of solution involving elections in which all forces would be free to participate would be best; at the same time, I have limited information. Some sticking points, I imagine, would be whether or not Assad would be allowed to stand as a candidate, or if certain religious parties would be allowed to participate (the current constitution of the Syrian Arab Republic states: "Carrying out any political activity or forming any political parties or groupings on the basis of religious, sectarian, tribal, regional, class-based, professional, or on discrimination based on gender, origin, race or color may not be undertaken;&quot .

[uawchild]

11. Nice distraction about Russia, meanwhile US troops on the ground in SYRIA? OMG

I guess the neocon article did it's job, we are all talking about Russia -- meanwhile, didn't WE just say we're sending TROOPS into Syria?

Oh, yeah, we did. Let's see how well that works out for us.

[Blue_Tires]

19. Oh, so Russia speaks for Syria now?

[Munificence]

22. We might

have got there first in Germany, but it looks like we'll just lose by a nose length in Syria.

[24601]

23. So does Iran and the Lebanese Hizballah. If this keels up, the Assad fan club will have standing

room only. Their unifying concept is that they are all assholes.

[Sunlei]

26. I guess Russia has 'self-approval"40% of those who manage to get to a field hospital are woman& kids

Press release Doctors without Borders


October 31, 2015
...
BRUSSELS/NEW YORK, OCTOBER 31, 2015 -- At least 70 people were killed and 550 injured in an airstrike and shelling on a marketplace yesterday in the Douma neighborhood near Damascus, Syria, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said Saturday.

"This was an extremely violent bombing,” said the director of a nearby MSF-supported hospital who assisted in the first wave of the mass-casualty response. “The wounds were worse than anything we’ve seen before, and there were large numbers of dead. We had to do many amputations. And a lot of the wounded had massive blood-loss, which means we needed large amounts of IV fluid and blood bags. We did our best to cope, but the number of critically wounded was far beyond what we could handle with our limited means.”

The marketplace bombing is an example of the intensification of bombings seen in northern and Central Syria in October, which could become even more horrific if it spreads to besieged areas of Damascus, where almost a million people are trapped with no way to escape, few medical facilities, and no options for medical evacuations of seriously wounded, MSF said.

The organization is urging permanent member states of the United Nations Security Council to comply with the mandate of protection they have been given in UN Security Council Resolution 2165 and to stop as fast as possible the escalating aerial massacres in Syria.

Because so many hospitals have been destroyed in Syria’s conflict, many facilities have moved services underground or split up services across different locations in a bid to remain operational. The entrance gate of the Douma makeshift hospital had been struck by bombing on October 29, killing 15 people and wounding 100 people. Because the services had recently been split across several buildings, the hospital was able to respond to part of the mass casualty influx. However, the overwhelming numbers of critically wounded patients meant that no one single hospital could cope, and six other makeshift hospitals also launched mass casualty responses to help treat the wounded from the marketplace bombing.

In the besieged areas around Damascus there has been a marked intensification of bombing on civilian infrastructure, such as hospitals and markets, during 2015. To date this year nearly 40 percent of people killed and war-wounded patients treated in MSF-supported medical facilities in the East Ghouta area have been women and children under 15 years old.

more here http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news-stories/press/press-releases

[treestar]

27. Ridiculous

use of military force is the abandonment of all law and agreement and civility.

[sofa king]

28. Don't cross the streams in your pissing contest, mkay?

[Sunlei]

29. PutinsAssad, its called "aerial massacres"

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/article/syria-marketplace-bombing-kills-least-70-and-wounds-550

[Darb]

30. Hence Obama putting force in Syria. Which translate to.......

fuck you Russia.