ZAKHAROVA: Russia “alarmed” at US threats to Syria

Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry has expressed concern over a statement from White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer and America’s Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley threatening Syria with heavy military retaliation for a chemical attack that the US says is being prepared. Both Spicer and Haley omitted to mention that according to the OPCW, Syria does not have any chemical weapons.

Maria Zakharova wrote,

“We know from the past that the (George) Bush regime has already used the falsification of facts on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq against its own people to carry out a military aggression against that country. We are seriously concerned over this”.

This echoes the words of Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov who warned against any violations of Syria’s sovereignty by the United States while chastising the US for failing to realise that the danger of chemical weapons used in Syria is not a threat posed by the Syrian government but by terrorist groups like al-Qaeda who are illegally operating in the country.

The statements from Peskov and Zakharova along with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s visit to a Russian airbase in Syria, demonstrate that Russia is taking the remarks from the US seriously and will not let them pass unchallenged.