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GERMAN INTELLIGENCE SAYS ASSAD DIDN'T ORDER CHEMICAL ATTACK
September 9, 2013 - 15:07 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net - President Bashar al-Assad did not personally order
last month's chemical weapons attack near Damascus that has triggered
calls for U.S. military intervention, and blocked numerous requests
from his military commanders to use chemical weapons against regime
opponents in recent months, a German newspaper has reported, citing
unidentified, high-level national security sources.
The intelligence findings were based on phone calls intercepted by a
German surveillance ship operated by the BND, the German intelligence
service, and deployed off the Syrian coast, Bild am Sonntag said,
according to the Guardian.
The intercepted communications suggested Assad, who is accused of
war crimes by the west, including foreign secretary William Hague,
was not himself involved in last month's attack or in other instances
when government forces have allegedly used chemical weapons.
Assad sought to exonerate himself from the August attack in which
hundreds died. "There has been no evidence that I used chemical
weapons against my own people," he said in an interview with CBS.
But the intercepts tended to add weight to the claims of the Obama
administration and Britain and France that elements of the Assad
regime, and not renegade rebel groups, were responsible for the attack
in the suburb of Ghouta, Bild said.
President Barack Obama is urging the U.S. Congress to approve military
action to deter the Syrian regime from using chemical weapons and
degrade its ability to pursue the two-and-a-half-year civil war
against rebel forces.
But Obama is facing stiff resistance from Democrats and Republicans in
the House of Representatives, who fear involvement in another Middle
East war, and from Assad's main ally, Russian president Vladimir Putin,
who has said any military strikes conducted without prior UN approval
would be illegal, the Guardian says.
Speaking in Paris on Sunday, Sept 8, during a European tour to rally
support for military action, John Kerry, U.S. Secretary of State, said
Washington did not rule out a return to the UN security council to
seek backing for military strikes, once UN inspectors have completed
an on-the-ground investigation of the August 21 attack. Their report
is expected by the end of the week.
Obama's main European ally, Francois Hollande of France, is under
increasing pressure to seek a UN mandate for any military action in
the face of opinion polls suggesting up to 64% of French people oppose
air strikes. In a bid to gain the support of fellow EU countries,
Hollande pledged at the weekend to take the UN investigatory report
into consideration before acting. Hollande also suggested he might
seek a UN resolution, despite previous Russian and Chinese vetoes.
"On President Hollande's comments with respect to the UN, the president
(Obama), and all of us, are listening carefully to all of our friends,"
Kerry said after meeting Arab League ministers. "No decision has been
made by the president."
"All of us agreed - not one dissenter - that Assad's deplorable use of
chemical weapons, which we know killed hundreds of innocent people ...
this crosses an international, global red line," Kerry said.
Kerry's meeting with Arab ministers, including from Saudi Arabia,
Egypt, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, followed talks in Lithuania
with European foreign ministers, who blamed the attack in Syria
on Assad but, aware of overwhelming public hostility to an attack,
refused to endorse military action.
Germany's chancellor, Angela Merkel, who faces a general election in
two weeks, led the charge to caution.
Only 12 of the G20 countries which held a summit in Russia last week
have backed the U.S. position.
The German intelligence findings concerning Assad's personal role may
complicate U.S.-led efforts to persuade the international community
that punitive military action is justified. They could also strengthen
suspicions that Assad no longer fully controls the country's security
apparatus.
Addressing a closed meeting of the German parliamentary committee last
week, the BND chief Gerhard Schindler said his agency shared the U.S.
view that the attack had been launched by the regime and not the
rebels. But he said the spy agency had not have conclusive evidence
either way, German media reported.
Schindler said that BND had intercepted a telephone call in which a
high-ranking member of Hezbollah in Lebanon told the Iranian embassy
in Damascus that Assad had made a big mistake when he gave the order
to use the chemicals, the magazine Der Spiegel said.
Schindler added that German intelligence believed Assad would likely
remain in power for some time - irrespective of any potential U.S.-led
military intervention - and that the civil war could drag on for years.
September 9, 2013 - 15:07 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net - President Bashar al-Assad did not personally order
last month's chemical weapons attack near Damascus that has triggered
calls for U.S. military intervention, and blocked numerous requests
from his military commanders to use chemical weapons against regime
opponents in recent months, a German newspaper has reported, citing
unidentified, high-level national security sources.
The intelligence findings were based on phone calls intercepted by a
German surveillance ship operated by the BND, the German intelligence
service, and deployed off the Syrian coast, Bild am Sonntag said,
according to the Guardian.
The intercepted communications suggested Assad, who is accused of
war crimes by the west, including foreign secretary William Hague,
was not himself involved in last month's attack or in other instances
when government forces have allegedly used chemical weapons.
Assad sought to exonerate himself from the August attack in which
hundreds died. "There has been no evidence that I used chemical
weapons against my own people," he said in an interview with CBS.
But the intercepts tended to add weight to the claims of the Obama
administration and Britain and France that elements of the Assad
regime, and not renegade rebel groups, were responsible for the attack
in the suburb of Ghouta, Bild said.
President Barack Obama is urging the U.S. Congress to approve military
action to deter the Syrian regime from using chemical weapons and
degrade its ability to pursue the two-and-a-half-year civil war
against rebel forces.
But Obama is facing stiff resistance from Democrats and Republicans in
the House of Representatives, who fear involvement in another Middle
East war, and from Assad's main ally, Russian president Vladimir Putin,
who has said any military strikes conducted without prior UN approval
would be illegal, the Guardian says.
Speaking in Paris on Sunday, Sept 8, during a European tour to rally
support for military action, John Kerry, U.S. Secretary of State, said
Washington did not rule out a return to the UN security council to
seek backing for military strikes, once UN inspectors have completed
an on-the-ground investigation of the August 21 attack. Their report
is expected by the end of the week.
Obama's main European ally, Francois Hollande of France, is under
increasing pressure to seek a UN mandate for any military action in
the face of opinion polls suggesting up to 64% of French people oppose
air strikes. In a bid to gain the support of fellow EU countries,
Hollande pledged at the weekend to take the UN investigatory report
into consideration before acting. Hollande also suggested he might
seek a UN resolution, despite previous Russian and Chinese vetoes.
"On President Hollande's comments with respect to the UN, the president
(Obama), and all of us, are listening carefully to all of our friends,"
Kerry said after meeting Arab League ministers. "No decision has been
made by the president."
"All of us agreed - not one dissenter - that Assad's deplorable use of
chemical weapons, which we know killed hundreds of innocent people ...
this crosses an international, global red line," Kerry said.
Kerry's meeting with Arab ministers, including from Saudi Arabia,
Egypt, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, followed talks in Lithuania
with European foreign ministers, who blamed the attack in Syria
on Assad but, aware of overwhelming public hostility to an attack,
refused to endorse military action.
Germany's chancellor, Angela Merkel, who faces a general election in
two weeks, led the charge to caution.
Only 12 of the G20 countries which held a summit in Russia last week
have backed the U.S. position.
The German intelligence findings concerning Assad's personal role may
complicate U.S.-led efforts to persuade the international community
that punitive military action is justified. They could also strengthen
suspicions that Assad no longer fully controls the country's security
apparatus.
Addressing a closed meeting of the German parliamentary committee last
week, the BND chief Gerhard Schindler said his agency shared the U.S.
view that the attack had been launched by the regime and not the
rebels. But he said the spy agency had not have conclusive evidence
either way, German media reported.
Schindler said that BND had intercepted a telephone call in which a
high-ranking member of Hezbollah in Lebanon told the Iranian embassy
in Damascus that Assad had made a big mistake when he gave the order
to use the chemicals, the magazine Der Spiegel said.
Schindler added that German intelligence believed Assad would likely
remain in power for some time - irrespective of any potential U.S.-led
military intervention - and that the civil war could drag on for years.