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U.N. probing more Syria chemical attacks, inspections to start
REUTERS Dominic Evans
4 hours ago
By Dominic Evans
BEIRUT (Reuters) - U.N. chemical weapons inspectors in Syria are investigating seven cases of alleged chemical or biological weapons use, including three incidents around Damascus after the August 21 attack which almost triggered U.S. air strikes.
In a statement from Damascus on Friday, the United Nations said inspectors probing the attacks had returned to Syria on Wednesday and expected to finalize their work on Monday on a report to be issued by late October. The United States and its allies say an initial U.N. report that said sarin gas was used on August 21 showed government forces were responsible.
Syria has denied that and accuses rebels of releasing gas. The United Nations itself has not assigned blame. The three most recent incidents it is looking into were in Bahhariyeh and Jobar, both east of central Damascus, on August 22 and 24, and Ashrafiat Sahnaya to the southwest of the capital on August 25.
The U.N. gave no further details of the latest incidents.
The outskirts of Damascus have seen some of the heaviest fighting in recent months. At least 20 people were killed and dozens wounded by a car bomb on Friday in the town of Rankus, 30 km (20 miles) to the north, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
From Tuesday, experts from international watchdog the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) will begin inspecting Syria's stockpile of toxic munitions, under the terms of a deal struck this month to avert U.S. military action.
A draft agreement on the stockpile inspections, obtained by Reuters and due to be voted on by OPCW member states in The Hague late on Friday, calls on members of to make cash donations to fund Syria's fast-tracked destruction operation.
The 41-member executive council of the OPCW is due to discuss and vote on the proposal at 10 p.m. (2000 GMT). It needs a simple majority to be passed, but decisions at the body are normally agreed upon by consensus.
U.S. President Barack Obama had prepared to attack President Bashar al-Assad's forces in response to the August 21 gassing. Faced with resistance in Congress, he accepted a proposal from Assad's Russian ally to refrain from strikes in return for Syria giving up its chemical arsenal by the middle of next year.
KILLINGS
Next month's U.N. report on the previous instances of gas being used will give more details of the August 21 incident. Other incidents include one in March in the northern town of Khan al-Assal, where authorities say rebels killed 25 people, including 16 soldiers. Rebels said government forces were behind it.
The two other cases from earlier this year both date back to April - one in the Aleppo district of Sheikh Maqsoud and another in the town of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.
The OPCW draft said funding is needed to hire inspectors and technical experts to destroy what Western intelligence agencies believe is about 1,000 tonnes of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agents, built up over decades and spread over dozens of locations. An OPCW official said an advance team would head for Syria on Monday.
Established to enforce the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, the OPCW has an annual budget of under $100 million and less than 500 staff. It does not have the manpower to carry out the task without significantly increasing resources.
Experts have said it will be risky and expensive to destroy the chemicals in Syria, where the civil war has killed more than 100,000 and displaced millions more.
Syria has just nine months to do what some countries, including Russia and the United States, have taken more than a decade to do.
Syria is instructed to provide inspectors with security and "immediate and unfettered" access to all sites. A failure to do so will trigger a meeting by the OPCW's core members within 24 hours, the draft says.
A U.N. Security Council Resolution, also to be voted on Friday, does not refer to the use of force as a means to enforce the destruction plan, a point which Washington had pressed for.
The OPCW inspectors will have 30 days to visit all chemical weapons facilities declared by Syria to the organisation last week, it states.
It is still unclear where and how the chemicals stockpile, the details of which have not been made public by the OPCW, will be destroyed.
Syria will appoint a person within the Damascus administration to handle questions on chemical weapons and by November 1 must have completely destroyed all chemical weapon production and mixing and filling facilities, the draft states.
(Additional reporting by Anthony Deutsch at The Hague; Editing by Alastair Macdonald)
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Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/u-n-checking-seven-reported-chemical-incidents-syria-111329589.html
__________
Quote:
It is still unclear where and how the chemicals stockpile, the details of which have not been made public by the OPCW, will be destroyed.
End quote.
What do you think?
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CBS News/ September 25, 2013, 6:30 PM
Poll: Obama approval drops to 43%
376 Comments
By Sarah Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Anthony Salvanto and Fred Backus
President Obama's job approval rating is just 43 percent now, down slightly from earlier this month and the lowest since March 2012. Forty-nine percent disapprove, the highest it has been in two years.
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Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57604620/poll-obama-approval-drops-to-43/
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World powers reach deal on removal of Syrian chemical weapons
NBC NEWS
Updated 13 minutes ago
By Andrea Mitchell and Erin McClam, NBC News
World powers have reached a deal to compel Syria to hand over its chemical weapons — a resolution that includes enforcement language but is not explicit on military action, diplomatic sources told NBC News on Thursday.
The United States and Russia have been at odds on how to force the handover. Those two countries negotiated the deal, and France played a large role in helping come up with compromise language, the sources said.
The deal includes a resolution with so-called Chapter 7 authority, a reference to a United Nations provision that allows member countries to take military and nonmilitary action to confront threats to peace and security.
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power confirmed the resolution on Twitter, saying that the measure was going to the full U.N. Security Council on Thursday night. Officials said they hope a vote could happen as early as Friday evening.
"The draft UNSCR establishes that #Syria's use of CW is threat to international peace & security & creates a new norm against the use of CW," another tweet from @AmbassadorPower said.
A senior State Department official called the agreement "a breakthrough arrived at through hard-fought diplomacy," adding it was unthinkable just two weeks ago.
"This is historic and unprecedented because it puts oversight of the Assad regime's compliance under international control and it's the first UNSCR to declare that the use of chemical weapons is a threat to peace and security " the official said. "Equally as important, it makes absolutely clear that failure of the Assad regime to comply will have consequences."
The U.S. and Russia reached agreement earlier this month on the outlines of a plan to rid Syria of chemical weapons. Syria satisfied the first part of the plan last week, when it gave the world a catalog of its weapons stockpile.
The agreement envisions the removal of chemical weapons from Syria by the middle of next year. The destruction of the weapons would be a joint mission between the U.N. Security Council and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
President Barack Obama had threatened a military strike on Syria to punish its president, Bashar Assad, for using chemical weapons in an Aug. 21 attack on a rebel-held neighborhood in the Syrian civil war.
Secretary of State John Kerry met Thursday with Wang Yi, the foreign minister of China, and a senior State Department official later told reporters that China backed a “mandatory and binding U.N. Security Council resolution” enforcing the handover of the chemical weapons.
The official would not go into detail about China’s position on how such a resolution would be enforced.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters that the draft resolution needed refining, but he expressed he optimism about a deal.
“Things have advanced,” he said, according to The Associated Press.
Catherine Chomiak and Jeff Black of NBC News contributed to this report.
This story was originally published on Thu Sep 26, 2013 10:45 PM EDT
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NEWS ANALYSIS
For Obama, an Evolving Doctrine on Foreign Policy
By DAVID E. SANGER
Published: September 24, 2013
344 Comments
WASHINGTON — For five years, President Obama has publicly struggled with the question of when America is willing to act as the world’s policeman, and when he will insist that others take the lead, or at least share the risks, costs and resentments it engenders.
He surged forces into Afghanistan only to quickly reverse himself, speeding the withdrawal with the declaration that “it is time to focus on nation-building here at home.” He briefly joined the fight to halt a slaughter in Libya, but left quickly and refused to go into Syria, a far more complex civil war he saw as nothing but a potential quagmire.
His speech Tuesday at the United Nations signaled how what some have called the Obama Doctrine is once again evolving.
In his first term, that doctrine was defined by Mr. Obama’s surprising comfort in using military force to confront direct threats to the United States. But he split with his predecessor George W. Bush in his deep reluctance to use American power in long, drawn-out conflicts where national interests were remote and allies were missing.
At the United Nations on Tuesday, Mr. Obama drove home the conclusion that he came to after his own party deserted him over a military response to the chemical weapons attack that killed more than 1,000 Syrians: The bigger risk for the world in coming years is not that the United States will try to build empires abroad, he argued, but that there will be a price to be paid in chaos and disorder if Americans elect to stay home.
To Mr. Obama’s mind, his aides say, his worldview has changed little since he came to office in 2009, after a campaign promising to end a “dumb war” and to renew outreach to America’s adversaries.
But his image around the world is radically different from what it once was. From South Asia to the Middle East, his presidency became known more for roughly 400 drone strikes against affiliates of Al Qaeda and cyberattacks on Iran’s nuclear program, both of which he saw as direct threats. Despite his early overtures, diplomacy in the region stagnated.
Now, after a remarkable month that began with his planning and then aborting a Tomahawk missile strike against the military facilities of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Mr. Obama has recommitted himself, he told world leaders on Tuesday, to devoting the rest of his presidency to two high-risk diplomatic initiatives: finding a negotiated end to the Iran confrontation, and creating a separate state for the Palestinians that Israel can live with, without fear.
Success in a region that has stymied two Bushes and two Clintons would become the legacy issue of his presidency — but three years and four months is not a long time to resolve disputes that date back decades. It was a measure of how complicated those efforts are that Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, shied away Tuesday not only from a handshake but also from any substantive discussion of resolving its disputes with a country it has long denounced as the Great Satan.
Conspicuously missing from those two top priorities was a strategy for a lasting solution in Syria, apart from assuring the world that, by negotiation or force, its chemical stockpiles would not be released again and the country would not become a safe haven for terrorist groups. But Mr. Obama did not describe a long-range strategy.
What makes the task all the harder for Mr. Obama is a sense that American power in the region is diminished — partly because United States forces have left Iraq; partly because Mr. Obama’s own team has been deeply divided on when to intervene; and partly because Mr. Obama’s own declaration of the “pivot” to Asia has been interpreted, rightly or wrongly, as evidence he has given up on the Middle East.
One could hear echoes of that frustration in his speech to the General Assembly, when Mr. Obama came to the edge of mocking those who accuse America of intervening to seek resources or influence across the globe. At once the United States “is chastised for meddling in the region, and accused of having a hand in all manner of conspiracy,” he said, even as it “is blamed for failing to do enough,” and for “showing indifference toward suffering Muslim populations.”
But a parallel debate has played out in the Situation Room of the White House, time and again. When his defense secretary at the time, Robert Gates, and his national security adviser, Tom Donilon, told him that he would be crazy to intervene in Libya — a country where, in Mr. Gates’s words, the United States had “no significant national interests” — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Mr. Donilon’s successor, Susan E. Rice, recalled the massacre of 800,000 Rwandans during the Clinton presidency, and said Mr. Obama could not allow another genocide in the making.
Reluctantly, Mr. Obama agreed, and ordered a bombing attack, alongside NATO and the Arab League. America could not stand by, he said later, because “that’s just not who we are.”
But last month, as he debated with his staff what looked like imminent American strikes on Syria, he talked about how the box he found himself in differed from what he had faced on Libya.
“He made the case that Libya was a lot simpler,” one participant in the conversation said recently, recounting the stages the president went through as he moved from tentatively embracing a bombing plan, to a failed effort to secure Congressional authorization, to the Russian-authored diplomacy now in place. “In Libya, he had only a narrow window of time to make the decision, or it would have been too late. He had a U.N. Security Council resolution.”
The president, the aide said, ran through his long list and concluded that in Syria, “all that is missing.”
But something deeper was going on as well: Mr. Obama had absorbed some bitter lessons. His decision to stay on in Afghanistan had not enhanced the perception of American power in the region, and Libya, once the bombing was over, descended into new chaos. Mr. Gates said last week that he saw, in the Syria gyrations, a president absorbing the lesson of a decade of American mistakes, and coming to the right conclusion after the worst possible process.
“Haven’t Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya taught us something about the unintended consequences of military action?” Mr. Gates asked.
T
he question left hanging now is when Mr. Obama will be willing to use force after five years of decidedly mixed experiences. His message now is that the failure of allies and regional neighbors to join with the United States has had a steady, corrosive effect on the American public’s willingness to act.
And indeed, after the Congressional rebellion over his threat for the briefest of strikes against Syria, it seems hard to imagine how Mr. Obama can credibly threaten the use of force if Mr. Assad reneges on the chemical weapons disarmament plan.
Iran may be a different case. There the stakes are far higher, for Mr. Obama and for his closest ally in the region, Israel, and he made it clear that he would not allow Iran to obtain a weapon on his watch. The question, after five years and several evolutions of the Obama Doctrine, is whether the Iranians believe him.
A version of this news analysis appears in print on September 25, 2013, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Obama’s Evolving Doctrine.
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Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/world/middleeast/obamas-evolving-doctrine.html?ref=syria&_r=0
______________
What do you think about "the analysis"'s conclusion:
"Iran may be a different case. There the stakes are far higher, for Mr. Obama and for his closest ally in the region, Israel, and he made it clear that he would not allow Iran to obtain a weapon on his watch. The question, after five years and several evolutions of the Obama Doctrine, is whether the Iranians believe him." ?
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Syria committed to chemical weapons deal: Assad
AFP
1 hour ago
Damascus (AFP) - Syria is committed to a deal to hand over its chemical weapons, President Bashar al-Assad said in an interview, as major powers inched closer to a UN resolution enshrining the agreement.
The Syrian president, in the interview with Venezuelan television station Telesur broadcast Wednesday, said he saw "no obstacles" to a plan under which Damascus will relinquish its chemical arms.
His comments came as UN experts arrived in Damascus to resume their investigations into around 14 incidents in which chemical weapons are alleged to have been used.
Assad told Telesur that his government was committed to the Chemical Weapons Convention, which it signed as part of the US-Russian agreement on the destruction of its chemical arsenal.
"Syria is generally committed to all the agreements that it signs," he said in the interview, which was published in full by the Syrian state news agency SANA on Thursday.
He said Damascus had begun to send the required details of its chemical arsenal to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons which is overseeing the deal, and that OPCW inspectors were expected to visit Syria.
"Experts (from the OPCW) will come to Syria in the coming period to look into the status of these weapons," he said.
"As the Syrian government, there are no serious obstacles.
"But there is always the possibility that the terrorists will obstruct the work of the experts by preventing them from accessing certain places," Assad added.
The Syrian regime calls all those fighting against it "terrorists".
Syria agreed to turn over its chemical arsenal under a deal thrashed out following an August 21 sarin attack in the suburbs of Damascus, which killed hundreds of people.
The attack, which occurred as UN chemical weapons experts were in Syria investigating previous alleged chemical attacks, was blamed on the Syrian regime by Washington and other international backers of the Syrian opposition.
Assad's government denies involvement, but agreed to turn over its chemical arsenal in the face of threatened US military action.
'Possibility of aggression'
The deal halted talk of a US assault, but Assad said it was "the possibility of aggression is always there".
"This time the pretext is chemical weapons, next time it will be something else," he said.
New Divisions Hit Syrian Opposition
At the United Nations, meanwhile, the permanent members of the Security Council made progress on a resolution enshrining the chemical weapons deal.
Some western envoys said important progress has been made on the resolution. One said there was agreement on "the main points" of a text which could be put to the 15-member Security Council.
The envoy said it could result in a resolution that allows for a later vote on sanctions under Chapter VII of the UN Charter if Syria fails to honour the Russia-US plan.
Russian officials denied however that there was any agreement on potential sanctions.
A senior State Department official cautioned to AFP: "We're making progress but we're not done yet."
US President Barack Obama told the UN General Assembly on Tuesday there had to be a "strong" resolution and French leader Francois Hollande said it must include the threat of eventual "coercive" measures.
But Russia, Assad's major backer, has fiercely opposed any move to allow eventual sanctions or military force under the UN Charter.
In Syria, a team of UN experts led by Swedish chief Ake Sellstrom were in Damascus for additional investigations into chemical weapons use.
After determining that sarin gas was used in the August 21 attack near Damascus, the team must now try to get to up to 14 sites where allegations of chemical weapons use have been made.
On the rebel side, the armed opposition was left further divided after key members of a Western-backed military command announced they were forming an alliance with the Al-Qaeda affiliated Al-Nusra Front.
The group of 13 rebel factions, including major battalions, rejected any foreign-based opposition group, including the West-backed Syrian National Coalition, which is based in Turkey.
Louay Muqdad, a spokesman for the rebel Free Syrian Army told AFP that the new alliance was a "gesture of despair".
He said opposition fighters were disappointed by the US-Russian deal and the lack of weapons flowing to the rebels, but also acknowledged the disillusionment with opposition forces based outside Syria.
He said General Salim Idriss, the nominal head of Syria's mainstream rebels, would travel "immediately" to Syria to rally his ranks.
At the UN, where the General Assembly is being held, nations pledged new aid to deal with the fallout from the 30-month conflict, which has left more than 110,000 dead, and displaced millions.
Britain on Wednesday pledged an extra 100 million pounds ($160 million)
to the humanitarian effort, a day after Washington announced $340 million in humanitarian aid for Syrians, bringing the US contribution to $1.3 billion.
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Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/un-powers-agree-main-points-syria-resolution-envoys-213224316.html
_____________
What do you think?
Can you trust what is called "Syria committed to chemical weapons deal" from dictator assad who used chemical weapons to killed his people ?
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It's Russia, not America, that has most to fear in Syria
By Richard Spencer - World - Last updated: September 25th, 2013
136 Comments Comment on this article
As time passes, the more it becomes apparent, as it should have been from the start, that the Russian "triumph" over America on the chemical weapons deal in Syria was an illusion. Vladimir Putin is driving Russia ever deeper into a mire in Syria. The conflict is repeatedly compared to the Iraq war, but the comparison with Afghanistan is much closer. Some have called it "Iran's Vietnam" but there's a chance it may become Russia's Afghanistan all over again. President Obama's decision to call off air and missile strikes in return for a chemical weapons deal may have been a short-term tactical win for Mr Putin, in that America was stopped, for now, from intervening in Russia's "patch" (though such an intervention was beginning to look less and less likely anyway). That is one stated goal of Mr Putin. His longer-term goal is to frustrate American expansionism (what Washington likes to see as the spread of Western democratic values).
However, a tactical victory is not the same as a long-term strategic victory, and even a series of tactical wins – occasionally frustrating American impulsiveness – is not a strategic victory. There is little evidence that Putinism is a more popular or successful creed than it was before, and now it is responsible in the eyes of the world for the chemical weapons arsenal of one of the bloodiest dictatorships of the last decade. Look at where Russia now is and where it once was. Syria, Russia's closest ally in the Arab world – perhaps its only true ally now – is on its last legs, hated, divided, riddled with rebels and al-Qaeda. If you want to think about what this means for Russia in the long-term, consider this video:
The observant among you will notice that the man with the red beard is talking Russian (as are the captions). Who is he? He is the leader of a particularly brutal al-Qaeda offshoot, Jaish al-Muhajireen wa Ansar, operating in Syria and he's a Chechen, as are a number of his men. This group is responsible for some of the nastier things, such as beheadings, and the capture of two Aleppo bishops, that you may have seen coming out of Syria, and it's done so much to harm the cause of the rebels that a number of them claim that in part or whole the group is run by the Russian intelligence services specifically for that purpose. That's probably nonsense, but from the Russian point of view, all the worse if it is. We have been told in Britain to worry about hardened jihadists returning from Syria (or Somalia) to strike back home. Yet we are no longer such a target as we were, having pulled out of Iraq, and being about to pull out of Afghanistan. Yet jihadists are being regularly told to focus on the insurgencies in those parts of the Russian Caucasus home to Muslim populations, such as Chechnya, Ingushetya and Daghestan. Remember Beslan? And this is before Russia is sucked militarily into the conflict. A good opportunity for that will come if, as its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov has promised, it provides troops to defend the chemical weapons inspectors tasked with dealing with the chemical weapons programme under the UN-sponsored deal.
Ah yes, chemical weapons. Back to that deal: Russian prestige in its announcement depended on the outside world listening to two very strong messages – without noticing that they were contradictory. One, repeated by Vladimir Putin in his article for The New York Times, was that President Assad was innocent of using chemical weapons and that it was the opposition's doing. The second was that Russia had scored a hit in persuading Mr Assad to give up his chemical weapons. There will be some who are so determined to deny Mr Assad's guilt that they will insist that this was some act of extraordinary benevolence by both leaders – a supreme example of turning the other cheek, to be the victim of a chemical weapons attack and give up your own in response.
However, if that is the case, the implicit agreement must be that Russia will defend Assad to the end, having taken away its ultimate deterrent, and that Russia has tied its own fortunes to the regime, as it unwittingly did in Afghanistan in the 1980s. It is far more likely, it seems to me, that Russia is convinced that the Aug 21 attack was the work of Mr Assad and that giving up his chemical weapons was its own (despairing) demand in return for continued support. There's an interesting anecdote (among many) in a New Yorker profile this week of the head of the Iranian al-Quds force in which US intelligence agencies in December saw Assad troops loading up chemical weapons, and, via Russia and Iran, had the attack stopped. It's unverifiable – of course – but it makes much more sense to see Russia as also tearing its hair out over its Syrian protégé (even Putin has given hints of that). Now Mr Putin has been handed the Syrian brief, but it is one he cannot now win. Russia will be vilified for Assad's crimes; but if Assad somehow wins – or at least stays in some sort of power – it is Iran whose interests will be preserved. It is not clear, any more, what interests Russia has in Syria, other than pride, and it can't have a lot of that, can it?
So much for Syria, but that's just one strategic loss suffered by Mr Putin. It is often said that he is more determined to oppose a UN resolution over Syria because he allowed one over Libya and felt cheated when the West used it to help topple Col Gaddafi. This argument has always seemed odd to me since it was perfectly obvious at the time that this was the intention of the UN resolution Britain and France pushed through, but it remains the case that the fall of Gaddafi also represented the death of someone else who – like Saddam before him – was an albeit eccentric and unreliable part-client of Russia (at least of its arms industry). Of course it needs to defend Assad – from Ceaucescu to Gaddafi, the final moments of Russian proteges have not been pretty. Meanwhile, while Mr Putin's attention was turned elsewhere, he's losing elsewhere too: see this Economist article) for how Russia is being replaced by China as the leading influence in Moscow's former Central Asian colonies.
There is little evidence, to me, that by the time Mr Putin does eventually retire, he will have restored Russia's place in the world. Much more likely, that his macho posturing will be seen to have obscured Russia's continuing decline, and prevented action to prevent it. The worst that can be said of President Obama meanwhile is that he is making the same mistake in Syria as President George Bush senior (allegedly) did in Afghanistan. Mrs Thatcher's famous warning about Mr Bush ("don't go wobbly, George!) could certainly apply to his current successor. By standing aside as Syria burns in the fallout from the growing inability of Russia to control its fiefdoms, he may well be setting aside trouble for later. Assad is unlikely to win back his northern kingdom, which could easily become a lawless centre for al-Qaeda operations, as Afghanistan did. But the truth is that strategically America has little to lose. It still has its key Middle East allies – Israel, the Gulf states. If a consensus with Iran is formed, unlikely I know but not to be ruled out, it could find its position strengthened, even if conflict continues in Syria. It will not be lost on Russia that if some sort of deal is done allowing Iranian oil back on to the market, prices will fall and its own oil-dependent economy will be in jeopardy. And what of Assad? Will he not be strengthened by this deal? It hardly seems likely. The rebels are still as near to the centre of Damascus as they were on Aug 21. They still control large parts of the country. That video I linked to earlier – it showed that Chechen group inspecting its conquest at Airbase 66 near Hama: another regime loss, ever closer to its heartland.
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Chân thành cám ơn Quý Anh Chị ghé thăm "conbenho Nguyễn Hoài Trang Blog".
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UN wrangles on Syria as Obama urges action
Shaun TANDON, Jo Biddle
5 hours ago
UNITED NATIONS, United States (AFP) - US President Barack Obama demanded the UN Security Council take tough action against Syria, as Russia wrangled with the West over how to strip Bashar al-Assad of chemical arms.
Syria dominated debate at the UN General Assembly summit as the United Nations confirmed inspectors will return to Syria on Wednesday to pursue an investigation of alleged attacks with banned poison gas.
Obama told world leaders the United States was ready to "use all elements of our power, including military force" in the Middle East to defend "core interests" such as ensuring oil supplies and eradicating weapons of mass destruction.
And he insisted international credibility was at stake after the August 21 chemical weapons attack near Damascus, which western nations have blamed on Assad.
Russia and the United States have agreed a plan to destroy Syria's chemical weapons, which Assad has accepted, and which they are now translating into a UN resolution.
"There must be a strong Security Council resolution to verify that the Assad regime is keeping its commitments, and there must be consequences if they fail to do so," Obama said.
France's President Francois Hollande also said there had to be a threat of eventual "coercive" measures to make Assad stick to the plan.
Obama and Hollande insisted Assad was behind the August attack. US intelligence says more than 1,400 people died, most of them civilians and many of them children.
Obama had threatened a punitive strike over the Damascus attack. But Russia stepped in with a plan for Assad to surrender his chemical arsenal.
In order to give the plan teeth, Western and Arab powers want a UN Security Council resolution to enshrine it in international law.
Russia, however, is at loggerheads with US, French and British envoys over the exact wording of the draft.
US Secretary of State John Kerry met for 90 minutes Tuesday with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in a bid to hammer out a draft resolution and told reporters afterwards the meeting was "very constructive."
But US officials admitted there were "three or four conceptual hurdles that had to be bridged" and the US and Russian envoys to the United Nations will now continue drafting a text.
"What we need is a binding, enforceable, verifiable regime that stands the very, very best chance of implementing the framework agreement and removing the chemical stockpiles from Syria," a senior State Department official said, asking not to be named.
The US side did not want leave any "loopholes" or "any ambiguity in the text about that goal, so that if there is non-compliance with it we all agree on next steps."
The US side wants a UN resolution which includes reference to Chapter VII of the UN Charter, which sets out various measures if the agreement is violated. Article 42 of Chapter VII threatens the use of military force, but that is not forming the basis of the draft resolution.
"The debate is not about use of force. It's about ... we want it to be binding and forceable and verifiable that's our basis. So we're not having a debate about that kind of term," another senior State Department official said.
"There are a range of consequences that can be had," the official added.
They want to use another Chapter VII article that would make the Russia-US plan mandatory under international law. In Hollande's account, the Security Council could meet again to decide sanctions if the accord violated.
In his speech, Obama said the United States would provide another $340 million in humanitarian aid for the Syrian crisis, which has produced some two million refugees, and left some 110,000 dead.
The State Department said the aid brings the US contribution to nearly $1.4 billion and includes support for food, clean water and shelter.
But the US and its Arab allies are also providing equipment for the Syrian rebels -- just as Moscow remains Damascus' main armorer.
Without singling countries out, UN chief Ban Ki-moon declared: "I appeal to all states to stop fuelling the bloodshed and to end the arms flows to all parties."
He urged Assad, his opponents and "all those in this hall with influence over them" to press for a peace conference to end a war that has left more than 100,000 dead.
But in a meeting with Kerry, the leader of the Syrian opposition Ahmad Jarba voiced "disappointment" that the US did not go ahead with the threatened military strike on the Syrian regime.
The new leader of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, a top backer of the Syrian rebels, said the civil war was raging due "to the inability of the Security Council" to take action as well as Assad's "continued intransigence."
And in another complication, 13 key Syrian Islamist groups said they did not recognize any foreign-based opposition group, including the main Syrian National Coalition.
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49% in Poll Fault Obama on Policies Outside U.S.
By DALIA SUSSMAN
Published: September 24, 2013
About half of Americans disapprove of the way President Obama is handling foreign policy, a new high as he confronts a diplomatic opening with Iran and efforts to remove chemical arms in Syria, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.
Forty-nine percent disapproved of Mr. Obama’s foreign policy efforts, up 10 points since early June, and 40 percent approved.
The president’s negative rating on foreign policy has grown among Americans of all political stripes, with disapproval up 8 points among Democrats, 10 points among Republicans and 13 points among independents.
The poll also found that 52 percent disapproved of the way Mr. Obama was handling the situation in Syria. On his handling of relations with Iran, 39 percent approved, while 44 percent disapproved.
“I think he’s looking very weak, and he put us in a dangerous situation with Syria,” Arlene Woods, 57, an independent voter from Ellicott City, Md., said in a follow-up interview. “I have a son in the military. When it doesn’t involve our own safety or security on our soil, then I don’t think it’s justifiable to use military force.”
Over all, Americans are dubious that relations with Iran will improve. Fewer than 1 in 4 think they will get better in the next few years, while a third think they will get worse, and 4 in 10 think they will stay about the same. In the poll, which was conducted after reports that Mr. Obama and the new Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, had exchanged letters, nearly 4 in 10 said they did not yet know enough to say how much of an effect the diplomatic efforts would have on the relations of the two countries. An additional 3 in 10 said the diplomatic efforts would affect relations a lot or some, while the same percentage said they would not have much of an effect.
On Syria, 82 percent of Americans supported the agreement between the United States and Russia to have Syria turn over all of its chemical weapons. Nevertheless, most — including those who supported the deal — lacked confidence that the Syrian government would do so.
Yet most Americans do not think that failure to comply is grounds for military action, underscoring the public’s deep resistance to involvement in the situation in Syria. The poll found that just 34 percent (including 46 percent of Democrats) support airstrikes against Syria if it does not turn over its chemical weapons, while 57 percent (including about 6 in 10 Republicans and independents) say the United States should not launch airstrikes against Syria at all. Five percent support airstrikes against Syria regardless of whether it turns over its chemical weapons.
Indeed, 68 percent said the United States does not have a responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria. And 64 percent said the Obama administration had not clearly explained what the United States’ goals were in Syria, though that was down from 79 percent earlier this month.
“I’d let the winds blow as they may, in that this is a civil war,” said Jim Wassall, 61, an independent from New Bedford, Mass. “I don’t condone the use of the chemical weaponry or biological weapons, but this is a civil war.”
Most Americans, the poll found, do not think that the killing of civilians by chemical or biological weapons requires a stronger response from the international community than killings by conventional weapons. More than two-thirds said the international community should respond to all civilian killings the same.
The national poll was conducted Sept. 19-23 among 1,014 adults on landlines and cellphones, and it has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.
Allison Kopicki contributed reporting.
A version of this article appears in print on September 25, 2013, on page A9 of the New York edition with the headline: 49% in Poll Fault Obama On Policies Outside U.S..
Chân thành cám ơn Quý Anh Chị ghé thăm "conbenho Nguyễn Hoài Trang Blog".
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UN General Assembly: Barack Obama's address in full
Barack Obama covered a wide range of topics in his speech to the 2013 UN General Assembly, ranging from pursuing diplomatic relations with Iran to the Syrian crisis. Here is his speech in full:
US President Barack Obama addreses the UN General Assembly Photo: SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES
The Telegraph
5:15PM BST 24 Sep 2013
Mr. President, Mr. Secretary-General, fellow delegates, ladies and gentlemen, each year we come together to reaffirm the founding vision of this institution. For most of recorded history, individual aspirations were subject to the whims of tyrants and empires. The divisions of race and religion and tribe were settled through the sword and the clash of armies.
The idea that nations and peoples could come together in peace to solve their disputes and advance a common prosperity seemed unimaginable. It took the awful carnage of two world wars to shift our thinking. The leaders who built the United Nations were not naive. They did not think this body could eradicate all wars. But in the wake of millions dead and continents in rubble, and with the development of nuclear weapons that could annihilate a planet, they understood that humanity could not survive the course it was on. So they gave us this institution, believing that it could allow us to resolve conflicts, enforce rules of behaviour, and build habits of cooperation that would grow stronger over time.
Now, for decades, the United Nations has, in fact, made a difference, from helping to eradicate disease, to educating children to brokering peace. But like every generation of leaders, we face new and profound challenges, and this body continues to be tested. The question is whether we possess the wisdom and the courage as nation- states and members of an international community to squarely meet those challenges, whether the United Nations can meet the tests of our time.
And for much of my tenure as president, some of our most urgent challenges have revolved around an increasingly integrated global economy, and our efforts to recover from the worst economic crisis of our lifetime.
Now, five years after the global economy collapsed, and thanks to coordinated efforts by the countries here today, jobs are being created, global financial systems have stabilised and people are once again being lifted out of poverty. But this progress is fragile and unequal. And we still have work to do together to assure that our citizens can access the opportunities that they need to thrive in the 21st century.
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Together, we've also worked to end a decade of war. Five years ago, nearly 180,000 Americans were serving in harm's way and the war in Iraq was the dominant issue in our relationship with the rest of the world. Today all of our troops have left Iraq. Next year an international coalition will end its war in Afghanistan, having achieved its mission of dismantling the core of al-Qaeda that attacked us on 9/11.
But the United States – these new circumstances have also meant shifting away from a perpetual war footing. Beyond bringing our troops home, we have limited the use of drones so they target only those who pose a continuing, imminent threat to the United States where capture is not feasible and there's a near-certainty of no civilian casualties. We're transferring detainees to other countries and trying terrorists in courts of law while working diligently to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay.
And just as reviewed how we deploy our extraordinary military capabilities in a way that lives up to our ideals, we've begun to review the way that we gather intelligence so that we properly balance the legitimate security concerns of our citizens and allies with the privacy concerns that all people share.
As a result of this work and cooperation with allies and partners, the world is more stable than it was five years ago.
But even a glance at today's headlines indicates that dangers remain. In Kenya we've seen terrorists target innocent civilians in a crowded shopping mall, and our hearts go out to the families of those who've been affected. In Pakistan nearly 100 people were recently killed by suicide bombers outside a church. In Iraq killings and car bombs continue to be a terrible part of life. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda has splintered into regional networks and militias which doesn't give them the capacity, at this point, to carry out attacks like 9/11, but does pose serious threats to governments and diplomats, businesses an civilians all across the globe.
Just as significantly, the convulsions in the Middle East and North Africa have laid bare deep divisions within societies as an old order is upended and people grapple with what comes next. Peaceful movements have too often been answered by violence, from those resisting change and from extremists trying to hijack change. Sectarian conflict has re-emerged, and the potential spread of weapons of mass destruction continues to cast a shadow over the pursuit of peace.
Nowhere have we seen these trends converge more powerfully than in Syria. Their peaceful protests against an authoritarian regime were met with repression and slaughter. In the face of such carnage, many retreated to their sectarian identities – Alawite, to the Sunni, Christian and Kurd, and the situation spiralled into civil war.
The international community recognised the stakes early on, but our response has not matched the scale of the challenge. Aid cannot keep pace with the suffering of the wounded and displaced. A peace process is stillborn. America and others have worked to bolster the moderate opposition, but extremist groups have still taken root to exploit the crisis. Assad's traditional allies have propped him up, citing principles of sovereignty to shield his regime. And on August 21st, the regime used chemical weapons in an attack that killed more than 1,000 people, including hundreds of children.
Now, the crisis in Syria and the destabilisation of the region goes to the heart of broader challenges that the international community must now confront. How should we respond to conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa, conflicts between countries but also conflicts within them? How do we address the choice of standing callously by while children are subjected to nerve gas or embroiling ourselves in someone else's civil war? What's the role of force in resolving disputes that threaten the stability of the region and undermine all basic standards of civilised conduct? And what's the role of the United Nations and international law in meeting cries for justice?
Today I want to outline where the United States of America stands on these issues.
With respect to Syria, we believe that as a starting point, the international community must enforce the ban on chemical weapons. When I stated my willingness to order a limited strike against the Assad regime in response to the brazen use of chemical weapons, I did not do so lightly. I did so because I believe it is in the national security interest of the United States and in the interest of the world to meaningfully enforce a prohibition whose origins are older than the United Nations itself.
The ban against the use of chemical weapons, even in war, has been agreed to by 98 per cent of humanity. It is strengthened by the searing memories of soldiers suffocating in the trenches, Jews slaughtered in gas chambers, Iranians poisoned in the many tens of thousands.
The evidence is overwhelming that the Assad regime used such weapons on August 21st. U.N. inspectors gave a clear accounting that advanced rockets fired large quantities of sarin gas on civilians. These rockets were fired from a regime-controlled neighbourhood and landed in opposition neighbourhoods. It's an insult to human reason and to the legitimacy of this institution to suggest that anyone other than the regime carried out this attack.
Now, I know that in the immediate aftermath of the attack, there were those who questioned the legitimacy of even a limited strike in the absence of a clear mandate from the Security Council.
But without a credible military threat, the Security Council had demonstrated no inclination to act at all. However, as I've discussed with President Putin for over a year, most recently in St. Petersburg, my preference has always been a diplomatic resolution to this issue. And in the past several weeks, the United States, Russia and our allies have reached an agreement to place Syria's chemical weapons under international control and then to destroy them.
The Syrian government took a first step by giving an accounting of its stockpiles. Now there must be a strong Security Council resolution to verify that the Assad regime is keeping its commitments. And there must be consequences if they fail to do so. If we cannot agree even on this, then it will show that the United Nations is incapable of enforcing the most basic of international laws. On the other hand, if we succeed, it will send a powerful message that the use of chemical weapons has no place in the 21st century and that this body means what it says.
An agreement on chemical weapons should energise a larger diplomatic effort to reach a political settlement within Syria. I do not believe that military action by those within Syria or by external powers can achieve a lasting peace. Nor do I believe that America or any nation should determine who will lead Syria. That is for the Syrian people to decide. Nevertheless, a leader who slaughtered his citizens and gassed children to death cannot regain the legitimacy to lead a badly fractured country.
The notion that Syria can somehow return to a pre-war status quo is a fantasy. It's time for Russia and Iran to realise that insisting on Assad's role will lead directly to the outcome that they fear: an increasingly violent space for extremists to operate.
In turn, those of us who continue to support the moderate opposition must persuade them that the Syrian people cannot afford a collapse of state institutions, and that a political settlement cannot be reached without addressing the legitimate fears and concerns about Alawites and other minorities.
We are committed to working this political track, and as we pursue a settlement, let's remember that this is not a zero sum endeavour. We're no longer in a Cold War. There's no great game to be won, nor does America have any interest in Syria beyond the well-being of its people, the stability of its neighbours, the elimination of chemical weapons and ensuring that it does not become a safe haven for terrorists.
I welcome the influence of all nations that can help bring about a peaceful resolution of Syria's civil war. And as we move the Geneva process forward, I urge all nations here to step up to meet humanitarian needs in Syria and surrounding countries.
America's committed over a billion dollars to this effort, and today, I can announce that we will be providing an additional $340 million. No aid can take the place of a political resolution that gives the Syrian people the chance to rebuild their country, but it can help desperate people to survive.
What broader conclusions can be drawn from America's policy towards Syria? I know there are those who've been frustrated by our unwillingness to use our military might to depose Assad, and believe that a failure to do so indicates a weakening of American resolve in the region. Others have suggested that my willingness to direct even limited military strikes to defer the further use of chemical weapons shows we've learned nothing from Iraq and that America continues to seek control over the Middle East for our own purposes.
In this way, the situation in Syria mirrors a contradiction that has persisted in the region for decades. The United States is chastised for meddling in the region, accused of having a hand in all manner of conspiracy, at the same time the United States is blamed for failing to do enough to solve the region's problems and for showing indifference towards suffering Muslim populations.
I realise some of this in inevitable, giving – given America's role in the world, but these contradictory attitudes have a practical impact on the American people's support for our involvement in the region and allow leaders in the region, as well as the international community sometimes to avoid addressing difficult problems themselves. So let me take this opportunity to outline what has been U.S. policy towards the Middle East and North Africa and what will be my policy during the remainder of my presidency.
The United States of America is prepared to use all elements of our power, including military force, to secure our core interests in the region. We will confront external aggression against our allies and partners, as we did in the Gulf War.
We will ensure the free flow of energy from the region to the world. Although America's steadily reducing our own dependence on imported oil, the world still depends on the region's energy supply, and a severe disruption could destabilise the entire global economy.
We will dismantle terrorist networks that threaten our people. Wherever possible, we will build the capacity of our partners, respect the sovereignty of nations and work to address the root causes of terror. But when it's necessary to defend the United States against terrorist attacks, we will take direct action.
And finally, we will not tolerate the development or use of weapons of mass destruction. Just as we consider the use of chemical weapons in Syria to be a threat to our own national security, we reject the development of nuclear weapons that could trigger a nuclear arms race in the region and undermine the global non-proliferation regime.
Now, to say that these are America's core interests is not to say that they are our only interests. We deeply believe it is in our interests to see a Middle East and North Africa that is peaceful and prosperous. And we'll continue to promote democracy and human rights and open markets because we believe these practices achieve peace and prosperity.
But I also believe that we can rarely achieve these objectives through unilateral American action, particularly through military action. Iraq shows us that democracy cannot simply be imposed by force. Rather, these objectives are best achieved when we partner with the international community and with the countries and peoples of the region.
So what does this mean going forward? In the near term, America's diplomatic efforts will focus on two particular issues: Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons and the Arab-Israeli conflict. While these issues are not the cause of all the region's problems, they have been a major source of instability for far too long, and resolving them can help serve as a foundation for a broader peace.
The United States and Iran have been isolated from one another since the Islamic Revolution of 1979. This mistrust has deep roots. Iranians have long complained of a history of U.S. interference in their affairs and of America's role in overthrowing an Iranian government during the Cold War. On the other hand, Americans see an Iranian government that has declared the United States an enemy and, directly or through proxies, taken American hostages, killed U.S. troops and civilians and threatened our ally Israel with destruction.
I don't believe this difficult history can be overcome overnight. The suspicions run too deep. But I do believe that if we can resolve the issue of Iran's nuclear program, that can serve as a major step down a long road towards a different relationship, one based on mutual interests and mutual respect.
Since I took office, I've made it clear in letters to the supreme leader in Iran and more recently to President Rouhani that America prefers to resolve our concerns over Iran's nuclear program peacefully, although we are determined to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
We are not seeking regime change, and we respect the right of the Iranian people to access peaceful nuclear energy. Instead, we insist that the Iranian government meet its responsibilities under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and U.N. Security Council resolutions.
Now, meanwhile, the supreme leader has issued a fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons, and President Rouhani has just recently reiterated that the Islamic Republic will never develop a nuclear weapon. So these statements made by our respective governments should offer the basis for a meaningful agreement. We should be able to achieve a resolution that respects the rights of the Iranian people while giving the world confidence that the Iranian program is peaceful.
But to succeed, conciliatory words will have to be matched by actions that are transparent and verifiable. After all, it's the Iranian government's choices that have led to the comprehensive sanctions that are currently in place. And this not – is not simply an issue between the United States and Iran. The world has seen Iran evade its responsibilities in the past and has an abiding interest in making sure that Iran meets its obligations in the future.
But I want to be clear. We are encouraged that President Rouhani received from the Iranian people a mandate to pursue a more moderate course. And given President Rouhani's stated commitment to reach an agreement, I am directing John Kerry to pursue this effort with the Iranian government, in close cooperation with the European Union, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia and China.
The roadblocks may prove to be too great, but I firmly believe the diplomatic path must be tested, for while the status quo will only deepen Iran's isolation, Iran's genuine commitment to go down a different path will be good for the region and the world and will help the Iranian people meet their extraordinary potential – in commerce and culture, in science and education.
We are also determined to resolve a conflict that goes back even further than our differences with Iran, and that is the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. I've made it clear that the United States will never compromise our commitment to Israel's security nor our support for its existence as a Jewish state. Earlier this year in Jerusalem, I was inspired by young Israelis who stood up for the belief that peace was necessary, just and possible. And I believe there's a growing recognition within Israel that the occupation of the West Bank is tearing at the democratic fabric of the Jewish state.
But the children of Israel have the right to live in a world where the nations assembled in this body fully recognise their country, and where we unequivocally reject those who fire rockets at their homes or incite others to hate them. Likewise, the United States remains committed to the belief that the Palestinian people have a right to live with security and dignity in their own sovereign state.
On the same trip, I had the opportunity to meet with young Palestinians in Ramallah whose ambition and incredible potential are matched by the pain they feel in having no firm place in the community of nations.
They are understandably cynical that real progress will ever be made, and they're frustrated by their families enduring the daily indignity of occupation.
But they too recognise that two states is the only real path to peace, because just as the Palestinian people must not be displaced, the state of Israel is here to stay.
So the time is now right for the entire international community to get behind the pursuit of peace. Already Israeli and Palestinian leaders have demonstrated a willingness to take significant political risks. President Abbas has put aside efforts to shortcut the pursuit of peace and come to the negotiating table. Prime Minister Netanyahu has released Palestinian prisoners and reaffirmed his commitment to a Palestinian state. Current talks are focused on final status issues of borders and security, refugees and Jerusalem.
So now the rest of us must be willing to take risks as well. Friends of Israel, including the United States, must recognise that Israel's security as a Jewish and democratic state depend on the realisation of a Palestinian state, and we should say so clearly. Arab states and those who supported the Palestinians must recognise that stability will only be served through a two-state solution and a secure Israel. All of us must recognise that peace will be a powerful tool to defeat extremists throughout the region and embolden those who are prepared to build a better future.
And moreover, ties of trade and commerce between Israelis and Arabs could be an engine of growth and opportunity at a time when too many young people in the region are languishing without work.
So let's emerge from the familiar corners of blame and prejudice. Let's support Israeli and Palestinian leaders who are prepared to walk the difficult road to peace. Real breakthroughs on these two issues – Iran's nuclear program and Israeli-Palestinian peace – would have a profound and positive impact on the entire Middle East and North Africa. But the current convulsions arising out of the Arab Spring remind us that a just and lasting peace cannot be measured only by agreements between nations.
It must also be measured by our ability to resolve conflict and promote justice within nations.
And by that measure, it's clear that all of us have a lot more work to do. When peaceful transitions began in Tunisia and Egypt, the entire world was filled with hope. And although the United States, like others, was struck by the speed of transition, and although we did not and in fact could not dictate events, we chose to support those who called for change, and we did so based on the belief that while these transitions will be hard and take time, societies based upon democracy and openness and the dignity of the individual will ultimately be more stable, more prosperous and more peaceful. Over the last few years, particularly in Egypt, we've seen just how hard this transition will be.
Mohamed Morsi was democratically elected but proved unwilling or unable to govern in a way that was fully inclusive. The interim government that replaced him responded to the desires of millions of Egyptians who believed the revolution had taken a wrong turn. But it too has made decisions inconsistent with inclusive democracy through an emergency law and restrictions on the press and civil society and opposition parties.
Of course, America's been attacked by all sides of this internal conflict, simultaneously accused of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood and engineering the removal of power. In fact, the United States has purposely avoided choosing sides. Our overriding interest throughout these past few years has been to encourage a government that legitimately reflects the will of the Egyptian people and recognises true democracy is requiring a respect for minority rights and the rule of law, freedom of speech and assembly and a strong civil society. That remains our interest today.
And so going forward, the United States will maintain a constructive relationship with the interim government that promotes core interests like the Camp David accords and counterterrorism, will continue support in areas like education that directly benefit the Egyptian people. But we have not proceeded with the delivery of certain military systems and our support will depend upon Egypt's progress in pursuing a more democratic path.
And our approach to Egypt reflects a larger point. The United States will, at times, work with governments that do not meet, at least in our view, the highest international expectations but who work with us on our core interests.
Nevertheless, we will not stop asserting principles that are consistent with our ideals, whether that means opposing the use of violence as a means of suppressing dissent or supporting the principles embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We will reject the notion that these principles are simply Western exports, incompatible with Islam or the Arab world. We believe they are the birthright of every person.
And while we recognise that our influence will at times be limited, although we will be wary of efforts to impose democracy through military force, and although we will at times be accused of hypocrisy and inconsistency, we will be engaged in the region for the long haul; for the hard work of forging freedom and democracy is the task of a generation. And this includes efforts to resolve sectarian tensions that continue to surface in places like Iraq, Bahrain and Syria.
We understand such long-standing issues cannot be solved by outsiders; they must be addressed by Muslim communities themselves. But we've seen grinding conflicts come to an end before, most recently in Northern Ireland, where Catholics and Protestants finally recognised that an endless cycle of conflict was causing both communities to fall behind a fast-moving world. And so we believe those same sectarian conflicts can be overcome in the Middle East and North Africa.
To summarise, the United States has a hard-earned humility when it comes to our ability to determine events inside other countries.
You know, the notion of American empire may be useful propaganda, but it isn't borne out by America's current policy or by public opinion – indeed, as recent debates within the United States over Syria clearly show. The danger for the world is not an America that is too eager to immerse itself in the affairs of other counties, or to take on every problem in the region as its own. The danger for the world is that the United States after a decade of war, rightly concerned about issues back home, aware of the hostilities that our engagement in the region has engendered throughout the Muslim world, may disengage, creating a vacuum of leadership that no other nation is ready to fill.
Now, I believe such disengagement would be a mistake. I believe America must remain engaged for our own security, but I also believe the world is better for it. Some may disagree, but I believe America is exceptional, in part because we have shown a willingness, through the sacrifice of blood and treasure, to stand up not only for our own narrow self-interest but for the interests of all.
I must be honest, though. We're far more likely to invest our energy in those countries that want to work with us, that invest in their people instead of a corrupt few; that embrace a vision of society where everyone can contribute, men and women, Shia or Sunni; Muslim, Christian or Jew, because from Europe to Asia, from Africa to the Americas, nations that have preserved on a democratic path have emerged more prosperous, more peaceful and more invested in upholding our common security and our common humanity.
And I believe that the same will hold true for the Arab world.
This leads me to a final point. There will be times when the breakdown of societies is so great, the violence against civilians so substantial that the international community will be called upon to act. This will require new thinking and some very tough choices. While the United Nations was designed to prevent wars between states, increasingly, we face the challenge of preventing slaughter within states. And these challenges will grow more pronounced as we are confronted with states that are fragile or failing, places where horrendous violence can put innocent men, women and children at risk, with no hope of protection from their national institutions.
I've made it clear that even when America's core interests are not directly threatened, we stand ready to do our part to prevent mass atrocities and protect basic human rights. But we cannot and should not bear that burden alone.
In Mali, we supported both the French intervention that successfully pushed back al-Qaida and the African forces who are keeping the peace. In Eastern Africa, we are working with partners to bring the Lord's Resistance Army to an end. And in Libya, when the Security Council provided a mandate to protect civilians, America joined a coalition that took action. Because of what we did there, countless lives were saved and a tyrant could not kill his way back to power.
I know that some now criticise the action in Libya as an object lesson, and they point to the problems that the country now confronts: a democratically-elected government struggling to provide security, armed groups, in some places extremists, ruling parts of a fractured land, and so these critics argue that any intervention to protect civilians is doomed to fail – look at Libya.
And no one's more mindful of these problems than I am, for they resulted in the death of four outstanding U.S. citizens who were committed to the Libyan people, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, a man whose courageous efforts helped save the city of Benghazi.
But does anyone truly believe that the situation in Libya would be better if Gadhafi had been allowed to kill, imprison or brutalise his people into submission? It's far more likely that without international action, Libya would now be engulfed in civil war and bloodshed. But we live in a world of imperfect choices. Different nations will not agree on the need for action in every instance, and the principle of sovereignty is at the centre of our international order. But sovereignty cannot be a shield for tyrants to commit wanton murder or an excuse for the international community to turn a blind eye.
While we need to be modest in our belief that we can remedy every evil, while we need to be mindful that the world is full of unintended consequences, should we really accept the notion that the world is powerless in the face of a Rwanda or a Srebrenica? If that's the world that people want to live in, they should say so and reckon with the cold logic of mass graves.
But I believe we can embrace a different future. And if we don't want to choose between inaction and war, we must get better, all of us, at the policies that prevent the breakdown of basic order, through respect for the responsibilities of nations and the – the rights of individuals, through meaningful sanctions for those who break the rules, through dogged diplomacy that resolves the root causes of conflict, not merely its aftermath, through development assistance that brings hope to the marginalised.
And yes, sometimes, although this will not be enough, at – there are going to be moments where the international community will need to acknowledge that the multilateral use of military force may be required to prevent the very worst from occurring.
Ultimately, this is the international community that America seeks, one where nations do not covet the land or resources of other nations, but one in which we carry out the founding purpose of this institution and where we all take responsibility, a world in which the rules established out of the horrors of war can help us resolve conflicts peacefully and prevent the kinds of wars that our forefathers fought, a world where human beings can live with dignity and meet their basic needs, whether they live in New York or Nairobi, in Peshawar or Damascus.
These are extraordinary times, with extraordinary opportunities. Thanks to human progress, a child born anywhere on Earth today can do things that, 60 years ago, would have been out of reach for the mass of humanity. I saw this in Africa, where nations moving beyond conflict are now poised to take off, and America's with them, partnering to feed the hungry and care for the sick and to bring power to places off the grid.
I see it across the Pacific region, where hundreds of millions have been lifted out of poverty in a single generation. I see it in the faces of young people everywhere, who can access the entire world with the click of a button and who are eager to join the cause of eradicating extreme poverty and combating climate change, starting businesses, expanding freedom, and leaving behind the old ideological battles of the past.
That's what's happening in Asia and Africa, it's happening in Europe and across the Americas. That's the future that the people of the Middle East and North Africa deserve as well, one where they can focus on opportunity instead of whether they'll be killed or repressed because of who they are or what they believe.
Time and again, nations and people have shown our capacity to change, to live up to humanity's highest ideals, to choose our better history. Last month I stood where 50 years ago Martin Luther King Jr. told America about his dream, at a time when many people of my race could not even vote for president. Earlier this year I stood in the small cell where Nelson Mandela endured decades cut off from his own people and the world.
Who are we to believe that today's challenges cannot be overcome, when we've seen what changes the human spirit can bring? Who in this hall can argue that the future belongs to those who seek to repress that spirit rather than those who seek to liberate it?
I know what side of history I want the United States of America to be on.
We're ready to meet tomorrow's challenges with you, firm in the belief that all men and women are in fact created equal, each individual possessed with a dignity and inalienable rights that cannot be denied. That is why we look to the future, not with fear, but with hope. And that's why we remain convinced that this community of nations can deliver a more peaceful, prosperous and just world to the next generation.
Thank you very much.
Chân thành cám ơn Quý Anh Chị ghé thăm "conbenho Nguyễn Hoài Trang Blog".
Xin được lắng nghe ý kiến chia sẻ của Quý Anh Chị trực tiếp tại Diễn Đàn Paltalk: 1Latdo Tapdoan Vietgian CSVN Phanquoc Bannuoc .
Kính chúc Sức Khỏe Quý Anh Chị .
conbenho
Tiểu Muội quantu
Nguyễn Hoài Trang
25092013
___________
Cộng sản Việt Nam là TỘI ÁC
Bao che, dung dưỡng TỘI ÁC là đồng lõa với TỘI ÁC
Obama: U.N. must ensure Syria's chemical weapons are destroyed
By Rebecca Kaplan /
CBS News/ September 24, 2013, 11:13 AM
President Obama called on the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution ensuring that Syria's chemical weapons stockpile is destroyed in accordance with an international ban, but is insisting that any such diplomatic agreement be backed by "consequences" if Syrian President Bashar Assad does not comply.
Speaking before the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday morning, the president warned that a failure to do so "will show that the U.N. is incapable of enforcing the most basic of international laws."
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57604374/obama-u.n-must-ensure-syrias-chemical-weapons-are-destroyed/
Chân thành cám ơn Quý Anh Chị ghé thăm "conbenho Nguyễn Hoài Trang Blog".
Xin được lắng nghe ý kiến chia sẻ của Quý Anh Chị trực tiếp tại Diễn Đàn Paltalk: 1Latdo Tapdoan Vietgian CSVN Phanquoc Bannuoc .
Kính chúc Sức Khỏe Quý Anh Chị .
conbenho
Tiểu Muội quantu
Nguyễn Hoài Trang
25092013
___________
Cộng sản Việt Nam là TỘI ÁC
Bao che, dung dưỡng TỘI ÁC là đồng lõa với TỘI ÁC
