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Russia to America’s rescue?
By Mick Krever
To many, Russia is taking the lead on resolving the standoff over Syria’s chemical weapons - but it doesn’t seem that way to Russia’s European Union ambassador, Vladimir Chizhov.
“It’s not an issue of claiming fatherhood,” he told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour from Brussels. “Success has many fathers, but failure is always an orphan. So we would like to share the fatherhood with anybody who is interested, provided it is a success.”
The plan has upended President Obama’s push for military action; he now is cautiously endorsing the proposal to put Syria’s chemical weapons under international control.
But what, exactly, that plan will entail is unclear. A Syrian cabinet minister told the AP on Wednesday that the weapons would not be physically moved, but would just be put under international supervision.
Chizhov disagreed with that assessment.
“It envisages placing the chemical weapons stockpile of Syria under international supervision,” he said, “and also addressing the issue of succession of the Syrian Arab Republic to the convention on banning chemical weapons.”
David Miliband tells Amanpour: Obama convinced Putin to shift policy because of military threat
By Mick Krever, CNN
Russia’s earthmoving proposal to secure chemical weapons was not the result of benevolence, but because of President Obama’s threat of force, David Miliband, the new head of the International Rescue Committee and former British Foreign Secretary told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday.
“I think President Obama convinced President Putin … that he was carrying a very big stick,” Miliband said in an exclusive interview in New York. “I think the Russians have taken that seriously. It would be wrong to describe Syria purely as a client state of Russia, but Russia is clearly a very influential ally of President Assad. And I think they've realized that the game was up. And I think that basically explains the shift that you're seeing.”
Whatever the outcome of a potential diplomatic deal – or military airstrikes – the humanitarian crisis in Syria seems to have gone ignored.
As the head of an organization whose chief focus is people in desperate situations, it is this aspect that Miliband is desperately trying to get the world to focus on.
“The use of chemical weapons is the tip of the humanitarian iceberg in this Syrian crisis,” he told Amanpour. “One in three Syrians have been driven from their homes. Two million Syrians out of the country.”
Imagine a World: An assault on humanity in India
An Indian court has just convicted four men in the gang-rape and murder of a young woman on a New Delhi bus last December.
According to UNICEF, 50% of Indian men condone domestic violence.
CNN's Christiane Amanpour tells the story.
How Russia’s Syria deal could be 'gone with the wind'
By Mick Krever, CNN
Frederic Hof used to be the point man on the Syrian transition in the U.S. State Department; now, out of government, he could hardly be more critical of President Barack Obama’s policy toward that country.
“I believe that the president should have been prepared right at the outset,” Hof, the former U.S. State Department special adviser to the transition in Syria, told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday. “I think he should have acted quickly. I think he should have authorized military strikes against the tools of terror: the artillery, the aircraft, the rockets, and the missiles.”
The potential for those strikes now is looking more and more remote, as a Russian proposal to have Syria turn over control of its chemical weapons gains traction among governments around the world, including the United States.
U.S. House Democrat Chris Van Hollen tells CNN’s Amanpour: Obama would have 30 days for chemical weapons plan before military force
By Mick Krever, CNN
U.S. President Barack Obama would have 30 days to work out a “credible plan” on Syria’s chemical weapons before he would be allowed to use force under a new proposed House resolution, House Democrat Chris Van Hollen told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday.
The revision comes on the back of fast-moving developments over a Russian plan to have Syria turn over control of its chemical weapons to an international body, which Van Hollen called a “very positive development.”
“There is this opportunity to accomplish our goal,” the House Democrat said, which he described as preventing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from using chemical weapons again.
“We all have an obligation to take this seriously,” Van Hollen told Amanpour. “But we also have an obligation to make sure that this is not a distraction.”
To that end, he said, a proposed House resolution would allow the president to use military action if after 30 days there were no agreement.
“I do think it’s important to have a backstop of a credible use of force,” Van Hollen said.
America's man in Moscow
Front and center in these fast-moving developments on Syria is the U.S.’s relationship with Russia.
Just before news broke of Russia's proposal to have Syria turn over control of its chemical weapons, CNN's Christiane Amanpour spoke with America’s man in Moscow, Ambassador Michael McFaul.
Click above to see Amanpour's interview with Ambassador McFaul.
Amanpour examines the evidence on Syria chemical weapons
By Mick Krever, CNN
What do we know about Western Nations’ intelligence on the Syrian chemical weapons attack, and who was behind it?
It’s a question that many people in and out of government have – whether for or against intervention – ever-mindful of the Iraq weapons of mass destruction fiasco.
On Monday, CNN’s Christiane Amanpour examined the issue with two experts: Jean Pascal Zanders, a chemical weapons expert, and Greg Thielmann, former chief of the nonproliferation analysis office in the State Department's intelligence bureau.
“Right now we seem to be in a spiral of confirmation bias on the part of the number of Western leaders,” Zanders told Amanpour from Geneva. “Much more can be put on the table – without compromising intelligence sources – about the nature of the investigations undertaken, how many samples were investigated, how widespread were those samples.”
Henry Kissinger tells Christiane Amanpour: 'I support President Obama' on Syria
By Mick Krever, CNN
“We can’t be the world’s policeman,” he told Amanpour, “but we can be the world’s last resort.”
Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Monday that, despite some reticence, he now supports a limited military intervention in Syria.
“I have been against American military intervention, and have said so publically,” Kissinger told Amanpour in New York. “This, however, is a use of weapons of mass destruction, which has consequences beyond Syria. … For that reason, and for the limited purpose of penalizing the use of weapons of mass destruction, I support President Obama’s request.”
Kissinger said that as much as he can, he has urged congress to authorize the U.S. president’s request to use force.
“It would have been a lot better if this had had a formal vote at the UN,” Kissinger said. “But in the last resort, and if the issue is important enough, the United States may have to act – really for the sake of everybody.”
“We can’t be the world’s policeman,” he told Amanpour, “but we can be the world’s last resort.”
President Obama's Syria PR offensive
Christiane Amanpour discusses President Obama’s PR offensive on Syria with Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger.
What impact will Russia’s proposal - to have Syria’s chemical weapons put under international control - have on the debate?
Watch Amanpour's interview with Borger above.
Syrian Ambassador Bashar Ja’afari: ‘Change – yes we can’
By Mick Krever, CNN
Syria’s ambassador to the UN said his country was “fed up with wars” and called any allegations of using chemical weapons “false and unfounded” in an exclusive and combative interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday.
“We haven't declared war to the United States or to any of our neighbors,” Bashar Ja’afari said from the United Nations. “We are not war mongers. We are not war advocates. We are a peaceful nation, a small nation, and we don’t pretend to be equally strong enough to confront the United States military.”
From the earliest days of the Syrian civil war, and President Bashar al-Assad’s brutal crackdown, Ja’afari has defended his government at the United Nations.
The United States, Britain and France say that they now have proof that the Assad regime used chemical weapons against its own people in an attack last week.
U.S. President Barack Obama is seeking congressional approval for a military strike against Syria.
“We are all victims of any escalation of the Syrian situation,” Ja’afari said. American and European claims against Assad’s regime, he said, “cannot be taken seriously and are not credible.”
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