Western Countries Pledge to 'Hold Accountable' Perpetrators of Chemical Attacks in Syria

Arab World

January 29th, 8:39am

London, Damascus - Asharq Al-Awsat

Douma was chemically attacked in 2018 (Reuters)

Western countries escalated their campaign against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, after the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) issued a report on Friday accusing Damascus of carrying a chemical weapon attack on Douma near the Syrian capital in 2018. The report concluded that there are "reasonable grounds to believe that the Syrian Arab Air Forces were the perpetrators of the chemical weapons attack on April 7, 2018, in Douma, Syrian Arab Republic." It indicated that at least one helicopter of the Syrian "Tiger Forces" Elite Unit dropped two yellow cylinders containing toxic chlorine gas on two apartment buildings in a civilian-inhabited area in Douma, killing 43 named individuals and affecting dozens more. In response, the Syrian Foreign Ministry said Saturday that the OPCW report contained no evidence and denied the new allegations. Syria denies using chemical weapons, but a previous joint inquiry of the UN and the OPCW found that the Syrian government used the nerve agent sarin in an April 2017 attack and has repeatedly used chlorine as a weapon, according to Reuters. On Friday, the US State Department distributed a joint statement from Secretary of State Antony Blinken, British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs James Cleverly, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna, and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock. The statement stated that the OPCW report marked the ninth instance of chemical weapons use independently attributed to the Assad regime by UN and OPCW mechanisms. "Our governments condemn in the strongest terms the Syrian regime's repeated use of these horrific weapons and remain steadfast in our demands that the Assad regime immediately complies with its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and relevant UN Security Council resolutions," read the statement. They asserted that Syria must fully declare and destroy its chemical weapons program and allow the deployment of OPCW staff to its country to verify it has done so. The report indicated that the Investigation and Identification Team (IIT) received credible information, corroborated through multiple sources, that Russian forces were co-located at Dumayr airbase alongside the Tiger Forces. The IIT also obtained information that, at the time of the attack, the airspace over Douma was exclusively controlled by the Syrian Arab Air Force and the Russian Aerospace Defence Forces. Although the ministers' statement did not directly accuse Russia of being involved in the chemical attack, it ​​called on the Russian Federation to stop shielding Syria from accountability for its use of chemical weapons. "No amount of disinformation from the Kremlin can hide its hand in abetting the Assad regime." The statement noted that Russian military police helped the Syrian regime obstruct OPCW access to the site of the attack and attempted to sanitize the area. Russian and Syrian troops also staged photographs later disseminated online to support its fabricated narratives of this incident. The ministers reaffirmed their commitment to hold accountable the perpetrators of all chemical weapons attacks in Syria and beyond. Meanwhile, the preparatory committee for the Arab and International Popular Campaign to Lift the Siege on Syria called on the Union of Arab Lawyers and all human rights organizations o study the possibility of prosecuting the US administration before the international courts for genocide and war crimes against humanity. The committee announced that it would prepare a comprehensive scientific study on the effects of the Western blockade on economic, social, health, educational, and cultural aspects. The Arab and International Popular Campaign to Lift the Siege on Syria was launched on December 28, with the participation of Arab parties, organizations, and figures that support the Syrian regime.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4125681/western-countries-pledge-hold-accountable-perpetrators-chemical-attacks-syria

Saudi Arabia Calls for Reviving Peace Process, Ending Occupation

Gulf

January 29th, 7:42am

Riyadh - Asharq Al-Awsat

Israeli police officers at the shooting site today in Jerusalem. (dpa)

Saudi Arabia warned that the situation between Palestinians and Israel may slip into “dangerous escalation” and called for reviving the peace process, the foreign affairs ministry said in a statement on Saturday. “The Kingdom condemns all that target civilians and confirms the importance of ending escalation, reviving the peace process, and ending the occupation,” the ministry added. A 13-year-old Palestinian opened fire in east Jerusalem on Saturday, wounding two Israelis, after another attacker killed seven outside a synagogue. Israel's emergency response service spokesperson said two men aged 47 and 23 sustained "gunshot wounds to their upper bodies. The two are being treated in a hospital and are in "moderate to serious condition." The Israeli police reported the arrest of 42 individuals related to the attack which is the deadliest in the city since 2008. The attack occurred near a synagogue on Neve Yaakov Street, and the Israeli police killed the attacker. The recents attacks coincide with an escalation in the clashes in the Palestinian territories, after bloody Israeli raids against the occupied West Bank. This was followed by Palestinian factions launching missiles from the Gaza Strip to which Israel responded to with raids on the Hamas-ruled Strip under siege.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4125646/saudi-arabia-calls-reviving-peace-process-ending-occupation

The US Has Made a Logical Decision. So Has Russia.

Opinion

January 29th, 6:09am

Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat - Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times

When the Ukrainian military made rapid advances in its autumn campaign, the fears of Russian nuclear retaliation were connected to a longstanding American interpretation of Russian strategic theory: “escalate to de-escalate,” the idea of using a limited nuclear strike to raise the stakes of conflict so high that your enemies see no choice but to bargain, regardless of their conventional advantages. In the months since, the return to a war of attrition and various Russian disavowals have eased nuclear anxieties somewhat. But an “escalate to de-escalate” theory remains relevant to the situation in Ukraine because it seems to inform both the American and the Russian strategies — conventional, not nuclear — for the spring campaign. Note that I said American strategy and not Ukrainian. Ukraine’s desired strategy remains what it’s been, understandably enough, for the entire war: escalate to win. Kyiv wants as many weapons as the West can send, it wants to reclaim every inch of territory, and it doesn’t want to entertain terms that would concede anything to the invading Russians. This attitude is shared by many hawkish voices in Europe and America, who continue to plan for Ukraine’s triumph and Vladimir Putin’s overthrow. But it is probably not shared by the Biden administration, or at least not by the key decision makers. Yes, the formal White House position is that Ukraine will have our support all the way to victory. But the cautious approach that President Biden and his team have taken to armaments that might radically change the balance of the war, the nudges encouraging Kyiv to show openness to negotiation, the concern about investing too heavily at the expense of our Asian commitments — all of this indicates that the White House’s proximate goal is a favorable armistice, not complete Russian defeat. To get to that imagined peace, though, you need to persuade the Russians that a true armistice — as opposed to another “frozen conflict,” in which warfare dies down but peace is never formally established — is in their interests, that if they keep the war simmering they will continue losing men and matériel at a brutal, regime-destabilizing pace. One hope was that the Ukrainian counteroffensive last fall and Europe’s so-far successful endurance of the winter months would be decisive in pushing Moscow toward accepting this reality, and even toward elaborating on its own proposals (no doubt unrealistic ones at first) for a negotiated settlement. But instead the Russians seem to be not just digging in but also girding for their own renewed offensive. Which explains, in turn, why the Biden White House and our European allies are cautiously — and with a certain amount of Germanic hesitancy — turning up the dial of escalation, enabling an increase in tanks and heavy armor flowing into Ukraine. So far this is not a policy designed to completely overwhelm a Russian mobilization or drive the Russians out of Ukraine. It’s a policy seemingly intended to blunt any new offensive, to potentially make the Russians lose more ground, and to show Moscow that it can’t win a grinding war any more easily than it initially hoped to win a short one. It’s an escalation that assumes the Russians need a little more convincing, and then they’ll be open to the de-escalation that we haven’t been able to achieve. But a similar logic also seems to be driving the Russian strategy — to the extent that we can see through the dark glass between us and Russian intentions, that is. From the assumed Russian perspective, Ukrainian gains in the fall and European resilience in the winter have made military success only more urgent. There’s no point in elaborating on peace proposals so long as the Ukrainians are convinced that they can win a total victory, and they’re more convinced of that than ever. So only once that hope is broken by force of arms can a settlement acceptable to Moscow begin to emerge. Which makes it necessary to prove militarily that stalemate is absolutely the best that Kyiv can hope for, that American and European support may suffice to hold ground but not to sweepingly reclaim it. And such proof can be delivered only through escalation, with de-escalation hopefully waiting on the other side. Hawks will object to this analysis by noting that we have no proof Russia actually wants real de-escalation at any stage short of conquest. (Hence the hawkish case for a more maximal, regime-change-oriented American commitment.) Doves will object that I’m overestimating the Biden White House’s real desire to reach a settlement and underestimating how much US policy is being set by war fever, military-industrial imperatives or a decaying liberalism’s romance with a distant nationalism. (Hence the dovish case for reducing or refusing further military aid to Kyiv.) But the reason to see the situation in the terms I’ve described, with both Washington and Moscow imagining themselves escalating toward a peace settlement, is that it’s such a historically familiar situation. A war breaks out, it’s expected to end swiftly but a stalemate ensues instead, and both sides become convinced that increasing their commitment to the conflict will bring it to a swifter end on more favorable terms. This mutual conviction isn’t a matter of romance or fantasy or simple folly (though of course those forces enter in). Instead, escalation is embraced as a coldly logical decision, as the only reasonable course. And out of such rationality, you get closer to the irrationality of fighting for years in a war that neither side can fully hope to win. The New York Times

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4125566/ross-douthat/us-has-made-logical-decision-so-has-russia

2 Indian Fighter Jets Crash, Killing Pilot

World

January 28th, 8:52am

Asharq Al-Awsat

People gather around the debris of a crashed aircraft in Bharatpur, Rajasthan, India, January 28, 2023 in this screen grab obtained from a handout video. (ANI/Handout via Reuters)

Two Indian air force jets crashed in the central state of Madhya Pradesh on Saturday, killing one pilot, officials said. The Indian air force said on Twitter the aircraft were on routine operational training mission. One of the three pilots involved sustained fatal injuries, and an inquiry has been ordered to determine the cause of the accident. It added the accident occurred near Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh state. The air force did not name the aircraft involved in the crash, but local media reported they were the Sukhoi-30 and Mirage-2000 fighter jets. Images from the crash site showed plumes of black smoke and flames rising from the debris of the aircraft. Two pilots managed to eject safely, but it is not clear whether the planes collided, Adarsh Katiyar, additional director general of police, told the Press Trust of India news agency. Madhya Pradesh's chief minister tweeted that the local administration will help the air force with rescue and relief efforts.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4124246/2-indian-fighter-jets-crash-killing-pilot

Trump Kicks off 2024 Bid with Events in Early Voting States

World

January 28th, 8:45am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Former President Donald Trump gestures as he announces he is running for president for the third time as he speaks at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Nov. 15, 2022. (AP)

Former President Donald Trump is set to kick off his 2024 White House bid on Saturday with visits to a pair of early voting states, his first campaign events since launching his bid more than two months ago. Trump will be the keynote speaker at the New Hampshire GOP’s annual meeting before traveling to Columbia, South Carolina, where he is set to unveil his leadership team at the Statehouse. The states hold two of the party’s first three nominating contests, giving them enormous power in selecting its nominee. Trump and his allies hope the events will offer a show of force behind the former president after a sluggish start to his campaign that left many questioning his commitment to running again. In recent weeks, his backers have been reaching out to political operatives and elected officials to secure support for Trump’s reelection at a critical juncture when other Republicans are preparing their own expected challenges. "The gun is fired, and the campaign season has started," said Stephen Stepanek, chair of the New Hampshire Republican Party and the co-chair of Trump's 2016 campaign in the state. While Trump remains the only declared 2024 presidential candidate, a host of potential challengers, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who served as Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, are widely expected to launch campaigns in the coming months. In South Carolina, Gov. Henry McMaster, US Sen. Lindsey Graham and several members of the state's congressional delegation plan to attend Saturday's event. But Trump's team has struggled to line up support from state lawmakers, even some who eagerly backed him during previous runs. Some have said that more than a year out from primary balloting is too early to make endorsements or that they're waiting to see who else enters the race. Others have said it is time for the party to move past Trump to a new generation of leadership. Republican state Rep. RJ May, vice chair of South Carolina’s state House Freedom Caucus, said he wasn't going to attend Trump's event because he was focused on the Freedom Caucus’ legislative fight with the GOP caucus. He indicated that he was open to other GOP candidates in the 2024 race. "I think we’re going to have a very strong slate of candidates here in South Carolina," said May, who voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020. He added, "I would 100% take a Donald Trump over Joe Biden." Dave Wilson, president of conservative Christian nonprofit Palmetto Family, said some conservative voters may have concerns over Trump's recent comments that Republicans who opposed abortion without exceptions had cost the party critical wins in the 2022 midterm elections. "It gives pause to some folks within the conservative ranks of the Republican Party as to whether or not we need the process to work itself out," said Wilson, whose group hosted Pence for a speech in 2021. He added: "You continue to have to earn your vote. Nothing is taken for granted." Acknowledging that Trump "did some phenomenal things when he was president," like securing a conservative US Supreme Court majority, Wilson said South Carolina’s GOP voters may be seeking "a candidate who can be the standard-bearer not only for now but to build ongoing momentum across America for conservatism for the next few decades." But Gerri McDaniel, who worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign and will be attending Saturday's event, rejected the idea that voters were ready to move on from the former president. "Some of the media keep saying he’s losing his support. No, he’s not," she said. "It’s only going to be greater than it was before because there are so many people who are angry about what’s happening in Washington." The South Carolina event, at a government building, surrounded by elected officials, is in some ways off-brand for a former reality television star who typically favors mega rallies and has tried to cultivate an outsider image. But the reality is that Trump is a former president who is seeking to reclaim the White House by contrasting his time in office with the current administration. Rallies are also expensive, and Trump, who is notoriously frugal, added new financial challenges when he deciding to launch his campaign in November — far earlier than many allies had urged. That leaves him subject to strict fundraising regulations and bars him from using his well-funded leadership PAC to pay for such events, which can cost several million dollars. Officials expect Trump to speak in the second-floor lobby of the Statehouse, an opulent ceremonial area between the House and Senate chambers. The venue has played host to some of South Carolina’s most notable political news moments, including Haley’s 2015 signing of a bill to remove the Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse grounds and Gov. Henry McMaster's 2021 signing of legislation banning abortions in the state after around six weeks of pregnancy. The state Supreme Court recently ruled the abortion law unconstitutional, and McMaster has vowed to seek a rehearing. Trump's nascent campaign has already sparked controversy, most particularly when he had dinner with Holocaust-denying white nationalist Nick Fuentes and the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, who had made a series of antisemitic comments. At the same time, he is the subject of a series of criminal investigations, including a probe into the discovery of hundreds of documents with classified markings at his Mar-a-Lago club and whether he obstructed justice by refusing to return them, as well as state and federal examinations of his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Still, Trump remains the only announced 2024 candidate, and early polling shows he's a favorite to win his party's nomination. Stepanek, who is required to remain neutral as New Hampshire party chair, dismissed the significance of Trump's slow start, which campaign officials say accounts for time spent putting infrastructure in place for a national campaign. In New Hampshire, he said, "there's been a lot of anticipation, a lot of excitement" for Trump's reelection. He said Trump's diehard supporters continue to stand behind him. "You have a lot of people who weren’t with him in ‘15, ’16, then became Trumpers, then became never-Trumpers," Stepanek said. "But the people who supported him in New Hampshire, who propelled him to his win in 2016 in the New Hampshire primary, they're all still there, waiting for the president."

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4124236/trump-kicks-2024-bid-events-early-voting-states

Yemen Urges Support for Legitimate Govt, Ending Houthi Ties to Iran

Arab World

January 28th, 6:54am

Aden - Ali Rabih

Foreign Minister Ahmed bin Awad bin Mubarak meets with Director of the Middle East and North Africa of German Foreign Office Dr. Tobias Tunkel.

Yemen’s legitimate government reiterated on Friday its call on the international community to provide it with political and economic support. Foreign Minister Ahmed bin Awad bin Mubarak met on Friday with Director of the Middle East and North Africa of German Foreign Office Dr. Tobias Tunkel to discuss the latest developments in Yemen. They addressed the efforts to end the war "caused by the Houthi aggression against the Yemeni people," the FM was quoted as saying by the state news agency Saba. He underscored the need to provide the suitable conditions to achieve peace and support the legitimate government. The officials tackled Iran’s obstructive role in Yemen and "the need for the Houthi militias to end their affiliations with it so that security and stability can be restored in the country." Tunkel stressed Germany’s support to peace efforts in Yemen, saying it "stands by the country’s unity and territorial integrity." Meanwhile, the government intensified efforts to combat the smuggling of Iranian weapons to the Houthis. Prime Minister Maeen Abdulmalik met with the central bank governor, defense minister, commander of the second military zone, customs officials and others to address the smuggling. The PM hailed the concerned authorities on their efforts and ordered that rewards be offered to the border employees and soldiers who seized the latest smuggled shipment. He ordered that a mechanism be put in place to encourage employees and offer rewards for busting smuggling attempts. The gatherers announced that more measures to combat the smuggling will be introduced.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4124066/yemen-urges-support-legitimate-govt-ending-houthi-ties-iran

Australian Open Chief Tells Djokovic Family: 'Be Really Careful'

Sports

January 28th, 6:44am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 21, 2023 Serbia's Novak Djokovic shakes hands with Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov after winning his third round match REUTERS/Loren Elliott

Australian Open chief Craig Tiley on Saturday advised Novak Djokovic's family to be "really careful" of people using the tournament's global exposure as a platform for "disruptive" purposes. It follows a video posted on a pro-Russian YouTube account showing Djokovic's father Srdjan posing in Melbourne Park with a fan holding a Russian flag that featured the face of Vladimir Putin. It sparked a backlash from Ukraine and led to calls for Djokovic senior to be banned from the tournament. He decided to skip his son's semi-final victory on Friday and it remains to be seen if he will be at Sunday's final. Tiley told the Melbourne Age newspaper he had spent "a fair amount of time talking to the Djokovic family,” AFP reported. "My advice is that you have to be really careful because if this is an event of global significance, it's a platform," he said he told them. "When you have hundreds of thousands of people come through the gate, you're going to naturally have some people that are coming here with an intention to be disruptive, and don't get yourself caught in the middle of that. "And they completely understand that," he added. "The family were very good. They were upset that it was taken that way. There was no intention of it. "His dad particularly does not support war and they're very focused on supporting peace." Serbian star Djokovic insisted after his semi-final win there had been a "misinterpretation" of the images and his father had "no intention whatsoever to support any war initiatives". He said his father had been greeting fans outside Rod Laver Arena after every match and had been "misused" on Wednesday night. Tiley said the Open had more than 1,000 accredited journalists and growing TV audiences and "it does become a platform and that's new for us. It never used to be like that". Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year, Russian and Belarusian players have normally competed under a neutral white flag as independents, as is the case at the Australian Open. Spectators have been banned from having Russian or Belarusian flags at the Grand Slam after Ukraine's ambassador to Australia and New Zealand demanded action when they were seen among the crowd early in the tournament.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/4124046/australian-open-chief-tells-djokovic-family-be-really-careful