US gives up on working with Russia on Syria
The United States announced Oct. 3 it was suspending bilateral engagement with Russia on Syria, saying there was nothing more to talk about as Russia intensified its air attacks on Aleppo.
WASHINGTON — Saying its patience with Russia has run out, the United States formally announced Oct. 3 it was suspending its bilateral engagement with Russia on Syria, a decision the United States said it did not take lightly. While the United States was withdrawing its personnel from Geneva and Amman, Jordan, where they had been sent to oversee a partial Syria cease-fire deal reached in March, the United States will continue to talk to Russia in multilateral settings, and de-confliction channels would continue to operate, it said.
“The United States spared no effort in negotiating and attempting to implement an arrangement with Russia aimed at reducing violence,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a statement announcing the decision Oct. 3.
“Unfortunately, Russia failed to live up to its own commitments … and was also either unwilling or unable to ensure Syrian regime adherence,” Kirby said. “Rather, Russia and the Syrian regime have chosen to pursue a military course … as demonstrated by their intensified attacks against civilian areas.”
The US decision came after American and Russian officials held talks all weekend in Geneva on ideas for reviving the Syria cease-fire, which collapsed last month, and as US Secretary of State John Kerry held multiple phone calls with his Russian counterpart in recent days. The deal’s failure has been followed by a punishing, unrelenting Syrian regime and Russian air assault on eastern Aleppo that has leveled hospitals, bakeries and apartment buildings, and killed and wounded hundreds of civilians in the enclave that is home to an estimated 250,000 people, shocking many in the West with its savagery.
