The Syrian opposition on Monday ruled out any chance of peace talks next month as President Vladimir Putin and UK Prime Minister David Cameron discussed the crisis over the phone and Russia warned the West against military intervention.

The news of the opposition's refusal to participate in peace talks came after a UN inspection team came under fire from snipers as they approached the site of an alleged chemical attack that killed more than 1,000 people in the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta.

The purported chemical attack occurred in the early morning on Aug. 21, killing civilian men, women and children as they slept.

Calls for military intervention intensified in the immediate aftermath of the attack, which activists said was carried out by authorities and Russia says was done by Syrian rebels to lure the West into war and derail peace talks.

But even as the UN team began its work Monday — after coming under fire by unidentified snipers, according to The Associated Press — several Western nations have said Syria's granting of access to the site of the attack was too little, too late.

European countries have called for an immediate reaction, with both the UK and Turkey saying a military intervention could take place without the authority of the UN Security Council, since Russia and China would likely veto the move.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called the statement "astonishing" and said intervention would be a "grave violation of international law," as well as of recent agreements reached at the G8 Summit in Northern Ireland that authorized the UN Security Council to make a decision on what actions should be taken in case of a chemical attack in Syria.

If the deaths in Eastern Ghouta are found to have been caused by a chemical attack, it would be the world's most lethal chemical attack since the 1980s. It is not clear, however, how long the UN team's investigation will take.

Putin's conversation with Cameron on Monday, the details of which are unclear, was initiated by the British side.

Russia has said the attack was likely a provocation by Syrian rebels who wanted Western nations to intervene in order to foil plans for a peace conference in Geneva next month. The peace conference has now been postponed for an indefinite amount of time, with rebels saying they want an "unconditional surrender" from the current regime before they'll sit down to talk.

The west is planning to shout a lot with threats of war and finger-pointing most likely in the wrong direction...

Hopefully the west will do nothing but sits on its butt and yet reorganise more accommodation for the refugees with the best compassion as possible... The west cannot align itself with the "rebels" without becoming the new friend of AlL QAEDA and Sunni extremists... That won't wash with anyone... Meanwhile, despite the threat and the carrot on offer from the Saudis (if this is true) the Russians could harden their position... The Saudis always play a double game, including one in Egypt where they support the crackdown of the army on the Sunni brotherhood... How come the Sunni Saudi support this attack on their brother Sunnis?... Well the Saudi are ruthless Islamic despotic ROYALS while the brotherhood is a ruthless Islamic despotic "socialist" organisation that also plans to get rid of the Royals in Saudi Arabia....

Trying to claim the high moral ground in this shit is not a good look... 

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem has said he rejects "utterly and completely" that Syrian government forces used chemical weapons.

He was speaking in Damascus after the US said there was "undeniable" proof of a chemical attack.

Mr Muallem said UN weapons inspectors had been unable to go to a second site because they were stopped by rebels.

The US and its allies are considering launching strikes on Syria in response to deadly attacks last week.

Mr Muallem told a news conference that if a military act was carried out against Syria, the pretext of chemical weapons would be false, baseless and groundless.

"They said the Syrian forces were the ones who carried out his attack. I deny this utterly and completely to [US Secretary of State John] Kerry," he said.

"There is no country in the world that uses a weapon of ultimate destruction against its own people."

The Syrian foreign minister also insisted the government was honouring all the pledges it made to the UN over access and protection for the inspectors.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23850274 

"We" know that the rebels have access to chemical weapons, thus the situation is not clear cut. It is most likely the "rebels" are trying to get the west involved on their side by organising an ugly incident and blaming Assad...

Meanwhile:

Russia has warned of "catastrophic consequences" for Syria and other regions within the Middle East if military intervention is taken in response to alleged chemical attacks last week.

In a statement, foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said: "Attempts to bypass the Security Council, once again to create artificial groundless excuses for a military intervention in the region are fraught with new suffering in Syria and catastrophic consequences for other countries of the Middle East and North Africa."

Iran has also since warned against foreign military intervention in Syria after US Secretary of State, John Kerry, last night accused Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian regime of deliberately unleashing chemical weapons on its own citizens in a statement.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syria-crisis-russia-warns-of-catastrophic-consequences-of-military-intervention-8785140.html

There is no high moral ground in this affair and going to war would only show how dumb the west is.

Britain has a responsibility to take action to punish the “morally indefensible” use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime even without a UN mandate, David Cameron has suggested.

In his first public comments on the crisis, the Prime Minister said today that the Government was considering “legal and proportionate” means to “deter and degrade” Assad’s chemical weapons capability.

But Mr Cameron and his deputy, Nick Clegg, appeared to imply that such action could take place without a mandate from the UN Security Council – or without waiting for weapons inspectors to report on their examination of the site of the alleged attack in Damscus last week, during which hundreds are reported to have died. Foreign Office lawyers and the Attorney General, Dominic Grieve, are understood already to have examined the legal route for military intervention in Syria using a controversial UN “ humanitarian” exemption that allows action without the Security Council’s authority.

Western intervention in Syria is likely to take the form of limited cruise missile strikes against regime targets and sites identified with chemical weapons sites. It is expected to take place within the next 10 days

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/the-heir-to-blair-david-cameron-makes-moral-case-for-attack-on-syria-in-echo-of-defence-for-iraq-war-8786783.html

Taking us for idiots...

And unfortunately there are many idiots out there — poor sods who are driven like sheep by Murdoch drivel, but there are especially bastards of the profiteering kind — conservatives with no morals but  with a heart full of the greatest hypocritical greed with excuses of goody-two-shoes that are more like "goody goody, here comes some biffo" —  who think war or limited war is the way to go... 

Come on, do something that does not have the word "weapons" in it...

Not about regime change?... The uncivil war is about this ! Government change! You Cameron idiot !! And until you can show us that Assad has signed a decree to use "chemical" weapons, WE HAVE NO WAY OF KNOWING IF  this attack was from his troops — as rogue troops who acted with no authority — or from THE REBELS WHO ALSO HAVE A STACK OF chemical weapons...

Since the day the "chemical weapons" were not in the picture yet, but were mentioned as a "trigger" for the West to go to war, it would be tempting for a few ruthless bastards on the rebel side to sacrifice a few of their mates for the 'GREAT SATAN" to come and fight on their behalf... Neat trick.  The USA did such things in the past and nothing is new.

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All the signs are they're going to do it again. The attack on Syria now being planned by the US and its allies will be the ninth direct western military intervention in an Arab or Muslim country in 15 years. Depending how you cut the cake, the looming bombardment follows onslaughts on Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Mali, as well as a string of murderous drone assaults on Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan.

The two former colonial powers that carved up the Middle East between them, Britain and France, are as ever chafing for a slice of the action as the US assembles yet another "coalition of the willing". And as in Iraq and Sudan (where President Clinton ordered an attack on a pharmaceuticals factory in retaliation for an al-Qaida bombing), intelligence about weapons of mass destruction is once again at the centre of the case being made for a western missile strike.

In both Iraq and Sudan, the intelligence was of course wrong. But once again, UN weapons inspectors are struggling to investigate WMD claims while the US and its friends have already declared them "undeniable". Once again they are planning to bypass the UN security council. Once again, they are dressing up military action as humanitarian, while failing to win the support of their own people.

The trigger for the buildup to a new intervention – what appears to have been a chemical weapons attack on the Damascus suburb of Ghouta – certainly has the hallmarks of a horrific atrocity. Hundreds, mostly civilians, are reported killed and many more wounded, their suffering caught on stomach-churning videos.

But so far no reliable evidence whatever has been produced to confirm even what chemical might have been used, let alone who delivered it. The western powers and their allies, including the Syrian rebels, insist the Syrian army was responsible. The Damascus government and its international backers, Russia and Iran, blame the rebels.

The regime, which has large stockpiles of chemical weapons, undoubtedly has the capability and the ruthlessness. But it's hard to see a rational motivation. Its forces have been gaining ground in recent months and the US has repeatedly stated that chemical weapons use is a "red line" for escalation.

For the same reason, the rebel camp (and its regional sponsors), which has been trying to engineer a western intervention in the Libya-Kosovo mould for the past two years to tip the military balance, clearly has an interest in that red line being crossed.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/27/attack-syria-chemical-weapon-escalate-backlash

From Robert Fisk

If Barack Obama decides to attack the Syrian regime, he has ensured – for the very first time in history – that the United States will be on the same side as al-Qa’ida.

Quite an alliance! Was it not the Three Musketeers who shouted “All for one and one for all” each time they sought combat? This really should be the new battle cry if – or when – the statesmen of the Western world go to war against Bashar al-Assad.

The men who destroyed so many thousands on 9/11 will then be fighting alongside the very nation whose innocents they so cruelly murdered almost exactly 12 years ago. Quite an achievement for Obama, Cameron, Hollande and the rest of the miniature warlords.

This, of course, will not be trumpeted by the Pentagon or the White House – nor, I suppose, by al-Qa’ida – though they are both trying to destroy Bashar. So are the Nusra front, one of al-Qa’ida’s affiliates. But it does raise some interesting possibilities.

Maybe the Americans should ask al-Qa’ida for intelligence help – after all, this is the group with “boots on the ground”, something the Americans have no interest in doing. And maybe al-Qa’ida could offer some target information facilities to the country which usually claims that the supporters of al-Qa’ida, rather than the Syrians, are the most wanted men in the world.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/does-obama-know-hes-fighting-on-alqaidas-side-8786680.html

Russia Issues Travel Warning About United States
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

MOSCOW — Countries often issue travel advisories warning citizens of danger abroad: war, for instance, or a terrorist threat or an outbreak of disease. The Russian Foreign Ministry posted advice of a somewhat different nature on Monday, cautioning people wanted by the United States not to visit nations that have an extradition treaty with it.

“Warning for Russian citizens traveling internationally,” the Foreign Ministry bulletin said. “Recently, detentions of Russian citizens in various countries, at the request of American law enforcement, have become more frequent — with the goal of extradition and legal prosecution in the United States.”

Citing examples in Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Latvia and Spain, the Foreign Ministry said, “Experience shows that the judicial proceedings against those who were in fact kidnapped and taken to the U.S. are of a biased character, based on shaky evidence, and clearly tilted toward conviction.”

Extradition has frequently been a contentious issue between Russia and the United States, but the disagreements have been particularly sharp in recent months over the case of Edward J. Snowden, the fugitive former intelligence contractor who is wanted on criminal espionage charges but has been granted temporary asylum in Russia.

In response to the demands by the Obama administration for Mr. Snowden’s return, Russian officials have said the United States has routinely ignored extradition requests from Russia. Russia has also complained about Russian citizens who have been arrested by the United States or by other countries at the Americans’ request.

In late July, a spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, criticized the arrest in the Dominican Republic of Aleksandr Panin, a Russian citizen wanted by the United States on charges related to cybercrimes.

Ms. Zakharova said Russia considered such arrests “a vicious trend, absolutely unacceptable and inadmissible.” She said the Russian government demanded that the United States request the arrest of Russian citizens directly from Moscow, under a 1999 treaty on assistance in criminal matters.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/03/world/europe/russia-issues-travel-warn...      

International diplomacy... see toon at top...