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U.S. hands Damascus its last warning
EFL
Colin Powell, the U.S. Secretary of State, said yesterday he had delivered a final warning to Syria to stop aiding terrorist groups. He said Damascus would have a price to pay if it failed to meet Washington's demands to close the offices of Islamic terrorist organizations in its country. "There are consequences lurking in the background," Mr. Powell said on U.S. television.
And a armored division or two lurking over the border
He did not specifically threaten military action in his meeting with Bashar Assad, the Syrian President, on Saturday — but he did say George W. Bush, the U.S. President, would "have all his options on the table" should Syria ignore the U.S. edict to change its ways following the destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq. "There are many ways to confront a nation," he said, adding that diplomatic and economic sanctions and military force are all possible.
Final warning, price to pay, consequences, Colin has been hanging out with Rummy.
Mr. Powell and other U.S. officials said yesterday that Damascus had already taken action to shut down terrorist offices, but Syrian officials declined to comment on those claims. "You have to ask him what he meant," said Bouthaina Shaaban, a spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry. "I'm really not entitled to answer. We are more interested in what he said about a comprehensive peace rather than what he said about offices," she said.
They're not listening
Officials with the groups identified for closure by Mr. Powell were more blunt: "I haven't been informed of any such thing," said Osama Hamdan, a Hamas official in Lebanon. "The Americans know well that our presence is part of the Palestinian presence in Syria and Lebanon and that it's not voluntary. It is forced, because of the occupation of our land and the expulsion of Palestinians [at the creation of Israel]," he said.
"It's the Jews fault!"
Visitors to the group's Damascus headquarters, as well as those of Islamic Jihad — another terrorist faction Mr. Powell demanded Syria shut — were told senior officials were travelling.
Running? On vacation? I heard Paris is nice in the spring.
Officials from Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim group backed by Syria and Iran, were similarly defiant. "I doubt anyone would answer [the U.S.] call, for as long as there is [Israeli] occupation, no one can even propose disarming the resistance," said Sheik Hassan Izzedine, a senior official of Hezbollah. "We are not worried a bit about the future and we consider ourselves people with a just cause and we reject any threat."
"Ain't nobody tellin' us what to do!"
Mr. Powell said the Bush administration will closely follow developments in the region, and warned that Syrian promises of action would not suffice. "There are no illusions in [Mr. Assad's] mind as to what we are looking for from Syria," he said. "There was, as we put it in diplomatic terms, a candid exchange of views, but it is not promises that we are interested in — or assurances — but it is action. We will see what happens in the days, weeks, months ahead."
"Every breath you take, every move you make, I'll be watching you."
Mr. Powell said since Damascus has a new neighbour with a changed power structure in Iraq, the United States "would be watching, and we would measure performance over time to see whether Syria is prepared now to move in a new direction in light of these changed circumstances."
Heh, heh, heh
Posted by: Steve 2003-05-05
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=13871