As the US and Russia traded accusations over their role in Syria and warplanes pounded Aleppo, global media weighed in on the worsening situation in the country.
“After so many atrocities, it is hard to be as shocked as one should be by the horrors of the war in Syria. Appalled, yes. But surprise is harder to muster,” said the Guardian in an editorial. “Week after week and month after month, the crimes mount up. Civilians have been attacked with chemical weapons and have learnt to fear the roar of government forces’ helicopters... and the deployment of cannons by rebels. Medical facilities have repeatedly been targeted,” it said.
However, the destruction of a UN aid convoy still managed to shock the international community, the paper said. “The airstrike on a UN aid convoy delivering food to a rebel-held area close to Aleppo was another low... If the attack was deliberate — and it is hard to believe otherwise — it was a war crime. The attack appeared to sound the death knell for a ceasefire that was painfully reached and had been greeted only tentatively as a potential step forward. It is now hard to regard a ceasefire as a meaningful concept in Syria.”
Meanwhile, the Boston Herald’s editorial position was emblematic of the typical response from US media over the issue. “Maybe there’s a limit to the nonsense that US Secretary of State John Kerry will swallow when it comes to the multi-sided civil war in Syria. Yes, as he said, the Russians are living in a ‘parallel universe’ with their proffered possible scenarios [a drone attack, an accidental fire and so forth] of what happened to a United Nations truck convoy carrying aid for civilians that was wiped out Monday,” the paper said in an editorial. “Kerry should have taken the opportunity then to announce to the UN Security Council a no-fly zone over Syria. He proposed a weaker move, an agreed no-fly policy,” the paper ruminated.
The Washington Post was even more belligerent in its tone, taking Kerry to task for his alleged soft-peddling on the issue.
“John F. Kerry declared that the cease-fire the attack had so gruesomely violated was ‘not dead’ — and called for more talks with Russia. Mr Kerry’s optimism was at odds with that of the Syrian and Russian governments: The former declared the cease-fire over, and the latter said its prospects were ‘very weak.’ His optimism also showed a shocking tolerance for atrocities committed by forces with which the United States is proposing to ally itself. The Obama administration pledged that if the truce held for seven days and humanitarian supplies were delivered, it would join with Russia in launching airstrikes against Syrian rebel forces deemed to be ‘terrorists’.”
The Yomiuri Shimbun in Japan also lamented another missed opportunity for peace in Syria and said: “The United States and Russia have engaged in a mud-slinging battle, with Washington claiming the attack was carried out by Russian or Syrian government aircraft and calling for the perpetrators to be held responsible, while Moscow denied culpability. The two countries also played a leading role in bringing about a truce in February, which lasted only a few months. The [Al] Assad administration and rebel groups were supposed to hold peace talks to establish a transitional government by August, but that plan also fell through... Didn’t the United States and Russia hurry to reach a ceasefire so as to deliver aid supplies safely and avert a humanitarian crisis? This is now a serious situation.”
The Hindu in India highlighted the two key challenges ahead, should another prospect of ceasefire arise: “First, can Russia genuinely halt Mr [Al] Assad’s fighter jets? Though Moscow wields strong influence over Damascus, it has in the past expressed uneasiness over the stubbornness of the regime. It is not clear if he will be prepared to make any meaningful compromises in the peace talks. Second, the rebels fighting the regime are not a unified force.’
The News in Pakistan was less optimistic, and blamed both US and Russia for the unravelling situation. “The false hope offered by a ceasefire in Syria has quickly vanished... As UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon rightly said at the UN General Assembly, a lot of the countries responsible for the Syrian war were sitting in the audience. One such example was the lecture that US President Barack Obama gave to the world this week from floor of the UN. The legacy Obama leaves behind will forever be tarnished by the blood on the streets of Syria.”
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