And so, three months after the US State Department famously flip-flopped, when first at the end of March Rex Tillerson said at a news conference that ‘the longer term status of President Assad will be decided by the Syrian people” adding that “our priority is no longer to sit and focus on getting Assad out” only to follow one week later with Tillerson’s warning to Russia that “coalition steps are underway to remove Assad” which in turn segued into the first US attack on Syrian soil with the launch of no less than 59 cruise missiles, the US has done it again and according to Foreign Policy, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has once again told the U. N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres that the fate of Syrian leader Bashar Al-Assad now lies in the hands of Russia, and that the Trump administration’s priority is limited to defeating the Islamic State.
The striking reversal was announced during a private State Department meeting last week, according to three diplomatic sources cited by FP.
And, as FP adds, “the remarks offer the latest stop on a bumpy U. S. policy ride that has left international observers with a case of diplomatic whiplash as they try to figure out whether the Trump administration will insist that Assad step down from power. Nearly three months ago, Tillerson had insisted that Assad would have to leave office because of his alleged use of chemical weapons.”
This post was published at Zero Hedge on Jul 3, 2017.
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