Obama warns of "consequences" for Syria in using chemical weapons
U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad of "consequences" in using chemical weapons in the Arab country's 21-month conflict.
Addressing at the National Defense University in Washington, D. C., the president repeated the warning echoed hours earlier by his top diplomat, Hillary Clinton, in Prague, the Czech Republic.
"Today, I want to make it absolutely clear to al-Assad and those under his command, the world is watching," Obama said at an event on securing nuclear weapons in former Soviet Union region.
"The use of chemical weapons is and would be totally unacceptable and if you make the tragic mistake of using these weapons there will be consequences and you will be held accountable," he said.
Clinton warns Assad over use of chemical arms
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday issued a "strong warning" to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad over the potential use of chemical weapons against the Syrian people.
"This is a red line for the United States," she told reporters in Prague. "Once again we issue a very strong warning to the Assad government that their behaviour is reprehensible. Their actions against their own people have been tragic," Clinton said.
"I'm not going to telegraph in any specifics what we would do in the event of credible evidence that the Assad government has resorted to using chemical weapons against their own people, but sufficing to say that we're certainly planning to take action if that eventuality were to occur," the top US diplomat stressed.
Clinton arrived in the Czech Republic on Monday for a brief visit, hoping to win a tussle with Russia and help secure a $10 billion nuclear plant contract for US giant Westinghouse.
After arriving before dawn in a snowy Prague, Clinton, on her first solo trip to the eastern European nation as secretary of state, was to meet later with Prime Minister Petr Necas and Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg.
Clinton, on the first leg of a five-day Europe trip, will spend less than 12 hours in the Czech Republic and head later to Brussels for talks with her Pakistani counterpart Hina Rabbani Khar.
She will then spend two days in Brussels for the annual NATO foreign ministers meeting, before travelling to Dublin later in the week for a meeting of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Her final stop on her 38th trip to Europe will be a short visit to Belfast on Friday.
Business consulting
