Syria: US Starts Dropping Ammunition To Rebels

“This successful airdrop provided ammunition to Syrian Arab groups whose leaders were appropriately vetted by the United States and have been fighting to remove ISIL from northern Syria”, Warren said.

On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said those talks, along with discussions with the United States, had yielded progress on the conflict, although Moscow, Washington and Riyadh did not agree in full “as yet”. “The idea is to formalize the relationship with Iran, Russian Federation and Syria”.

A group of roughly 70 U.S.-trained rebels from Division 30 had crossed the border with Syria in August this year; but as soon as they arrived in Syria, majority handed over their weapons to Al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.

Putin also said that Turkey was one of Russia’s most important partners, and that Russian Federation needed to understand how to build relations with Turkey to fight terrorism.

When asked about the failure to train and equip Syrian rebels, Obama conceded the $500 million effort “did not work”, but he also argued, “I’ve been skeptical from the get-go about the notion that we were going to effectively create this proxy army inside Syria”.

The previous day, large sections of the Western media had been filled with false stories that Russian airstrikes had killed civilians in Syria, with the US Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, even calling on Russia to “cease attacks on civilians”.

They were unable to agree on whether Assad should have any role in ending the crisis but they did decide to extend sanctions by essentially freezing the assets of the spouses of senior Syrian figures. “The Assad regime bears the greatest responsibility for the 250.000 deaths of the conflict and the millions of displaced people”. In its briefings, it describes all of the targets it strikes as belonging to Islamic State.

Russian Federation says 2,400 of its citizens have joined the Islamic State group.

But exactly how they’re doing that remains a point of contention: Are Russians really focused on pummeling ISIS, or are they targeting Syrian rebels demanding an end to the Assad dynasty?

The new alliance includes the YPG, various Arab groups including Jaysh al-Thuwwar (Army of Rebels) and the Arab tribal Jaysh al-Sanadeed, and an Assyrian Christian group, according to a statement announcing its establishment.

After Syrian government troops withdrew from majority-Kurdish areas in 2012, a Kurdish-led autonomous administration stepped in to fill the void. Washington has indicated that it could direct funding and weapons to Arab commanders on the ground who cooperate with the YPG.

“They told us we had to leave or they would tell the U.S. coalition that we were terrorists and their planes would hit us and our families”, said one resident, Safwan. The Observatory and Bali said the aim of the coalition in the future will be to march toward the northern city of Raqqa which is the Islamic State’s declared capital.