A rchive Date
[ 14-04-2003 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
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[http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2003/04/14/64389-ap.html
U.S. skirts question of new war
By SCOTT LINDLAW - Associated Press
Mon, April 14, 2003
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration, increasingly angry with Syria, wants to ensure that Damascus gets the message sent by Saddam Hussein's collapse and stops harboring leaders of Iraq's toppled government.
President Bush was careful to stop short of threatening war against Syria, though he warned the country not to take in Iraqi leaders. He also charged that Syria has chemical weapons.
"They just need to cooperate," Bush said Sunday.
Syria flatly denied the accusations.
"Of course Syria has no chemical weapons," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Bouthayna Shaaban told Lebanon's Al-Hayat-LBC satellite channel late Sunday.
Syria has also denied that any members of the Iraqi leadership had fled to Damascus and says it has closed its border with Iraq.
America's principal ally in the Iraq war downplayed the prospect of bringing the war to Syria.
"We have made it clear that there are no plans for Syria to be next on the list," Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told reporters in Manama, Bahrain, the first leg of a Mideast tour to discuss rebuilding Iraq. "But there are questions that the Syrians need to answer."
Straw was also less certain than his U.S. counterparts of accusations that Syria has weapons of mass destruction. "I'm not sure, and that's why we need to talk to them about it," Straw said.
Syrian President Bashar Assad met Monday with British Junior Foreign Minister Mike O'Brien to consult on postwar Iraq.
Other top U.S. officials made plain the administration's growing frustration with Syria.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the majority of foreign fighters in Iraq were from Syria, brought in by the "busloads." On one bus, military authorities found leaflets that offered rewards for killing Americans, and several hundred thousand dollars in cash, Rumsfeld said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Rumsfeld also said top members of Saddam's government had fled to neighboring Syria. U.S.-led forces captured Saddam's half brother in northern Iraq, and said he had planned to cross the border.
Rumsfeld warned Syria last month to stop sending military equipment - including night-vision goggles - to Iraqi forces.
"We consider such trafficking as hostile acts and will hold the Syrian government accountable for such shipments," he said.
Asked Sunday whether Syria had heeded those demands, Rumsfeld replied, "Not noticeably."
Bush and Rumsfeld seemed eager to make sure that Damascus understood the message in the coalition's toppling of Saddam.
"People have got to know that we are serious about stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction," Bush told reporters.
Noting that Syria is on the State Department's list of countries that sponsor terrorism, Rumsfeld said on NBC's "Meet the Press": "Being on the terrorist list is not some place I'd want to be."
Syria's deputy ambassador to the United States, Imad Moustapha, said the administration's flurry of charges was a "campaign of misinformation and disinformation" meant to divert attention from the "human catastrophes" taking place in wartime Iraq.
Asked whether Syria was a good candidate for his "axis of evil," Bush laughed and said, "We will deal with each situation as it arises."
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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