Airstrike on Syrian town hit by chemical weapons kills 1

A still from a video released by the U.S. Navy on Thursday evening shows the guided-missile destroyer USS Porter (DDG 78) as it conducts strike operations while in the Mediterranean Sea.

The chemical attack on civilians was followed up by worldwide condemnation, leading President Donald Trump to rain down 59 Tomahawk missiles on the airbase responsible. But the ambiguity surrounding the Syrian missile attack reflects the Trump administration’s broader foreign policy approach, which, in turn, is reflective of Trump himself. Russian Federation is the Syrian regime’s main ally in the nation’s six-year-long civil war.

The missile strikes hit the government-controlled Shayrat air base in central Syria, where US officials say the Syrian military planes that dropped the chemicals had taken off.

“The United States attacked the territory of sovereign Syria”, Russian Deputy Ambassador Vladimir Safronkov told the council, denouncing a “flagrant violation of worldwide law and an act of aggression”.

Trump’s actions have broad support in Congress, including from Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer and stronger approval from Republicans like John McCain and Mitch McConnell.

Syrian state TV reported a USA missile attack on a number of military targets and called the attack an “aggression”.

United States officials informed Russian forces ahead of the missile strikes and avoided hitting Russian personnel. The U.N. says the Islamic State group has used crude chemical weapons in both Syria and Iraq.

Russian minister for foreign affairs Sergei Lavrov and USA secretary of state Rex Tillerson spoke by phone on Saturday about the situation in Syria after U.S. strikes on a Syrian air base, the Russian foreign ministry has said in a statement.

Writing in The Sunday Times, Sir Michael said Russian Federation must be part of the solution to ending the “needless suffering” of Syrian civilians. Further pinprick attacks will achieve little, while deeper USA military involvement would be widely unpopular in the US-and arguably illegal without congressional authorization.

But the United States is likely to have unleashed far more than it anticipated, particularly given the current lack of any meaningful political strategy to follow the military attacks.

Ahead of disarmament, Assad’s government disclosed it had some 1,300 tons of chemical weapons, including sarin, VX nerve agent and mustard gas. We struck an Assad airfield in retaliation to a chemical attack that was likely the work of the government, but hadn’t been fully confirmed yet.

The Foreign Secretary cited Russia’s support of the Assad regime in the wake of an alleged chemical attack on their own people as the reason for cancelling a visit to Moscow scheduled for April 10.

Haley also called out Russian Federation, saying it, along with Iran, bears considerable responsibility for the crisis in Syria since “every time Assad has crossed the line of human decency, Russian Federation has stood beside him”.

He said the best outcome would be a peace agreement that leads to a transitional government accepted by all Syrians, followed by elections in which all Syrians, including those living overseas, could vote for new leadership. The base’s runway was still in use. The U.S.is, however, trying to change Assad’s policy on chemical weapons.

Assad’s government has denied any involvement in the attack in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in the rebel-held Idlib province.

Russia expects Tillerson to explain Washington’s stance when he visits Moscow next week, Interfax news agency cited a Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman as saying. “On Tuesday, the Assad regime launched yet another chemical attack on civilians, murdering innocent men, women, and children in the most gruesome way”.

A USA defence official also clarified that the strikes conducted by the nation were not meant to damage runways or fully disable the Syria base.

What happened in the United States air strike?