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Thanks, Obama!
When Obama decided against striking Syria in favor of Putin’s offer to coordinate the extraction of all of Syria’s WMDs, lots of neocons started screaming. Yesterday, the final shipment left Syria’s shores. We were all told this would never happen. It just did. Now ask yourself: if Obama had bombed Assad, do you think those chemical weapons would now be secure? And if they were still in Syria, with ISIS raging nearby, we’d have a real international crisis, wouldn’t we? Dick Cheney’s nightmare – Jihadists with WMDs – would be one step closer to reality. But, thanks to Obama (and not Bush) the threat of those WMDs from Syria has evaporated, and Iran’s nukes could be next. Without invading anywhere or torturing anyone.
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updated 10:53 AM EDT 06.23.14
Last 'declared' chemical arms leave Syria
By Ashley Fantz and Diana Magnay, CNN
(CNN) - The final stockpile of Syria's chemical weapons has been shipped out of the country, according to the OPCW, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
Ahmet Uzumcu, the chief of the international watchdog organization, said the weapons were loaded Monday aboard the Danish ship Ark Futura and departed the Syrian port of Latakia.
"A major landmark has been reached today," Uzumcu said, qualifying that that meant all "declared" weapons were out of the country.
"We cannot say for sure it has no more chemical weapons," Uzumcu said. "All we can do is work on the basis of verifying a country's declarations of what they have. I would not make any speculation to possible remaining assets, substances, chemical weapons. ... "
It has been more than a year since the Obama administration said that Syria had crossed a "red line" with its use of chemical weapons during the nation's civil war, which has raged since 2011.
In August 2013, U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky told reporters that a team of experts had gathered to go to Syria to investigate reports of chemical weapons. Later that month, video and witness accounts appeared to support the allegations that scores of people killed outside the Syrian capital of Damascus had been poisoned with chemical weapons. The nonpartisan Doctors Without Borders then reported that three hospitals near Damascus treated more than 3,000 patients suffering "neurotoxic symptoms."
When Obama decided against striking Syria in favor of Putin’s offer to coordinate the extraction of all of Syria’s WMDs, lots of neocons started screaming. Yesterday, the final shipment left Syria’s shores. We were all told this would never happen. It just did. Now ask yourself: if Obama had bombed Assad, do you think those chemical weapons would now be secure? And if they were still in Syria, with ISIS raging nearby, we’d have a real international crisis, wouldn’t we? Dick Cheney’s nightmare – Jihadists with WMDs – would be one step closer to reality. But, thanks to Obama (and not Bush) the threat of those WMDs from Syria has evaporated, and Iran’s nukes could be next. Without invading anywhere or torturing anyone.
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////
updated 10:53 AM EDT 06.23.14
Last 'declared' chemical arms leave Syria
By Ashley Fantz and Diana Magnay, CNN
(CNN) - The final stockpile of Syria's chemical weapons has been shipped out of the country, according to the OPCW, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
Ahmet Uzumcu, the chief of the international watchdog organization, said the weapons were loaded Monday aboard the Danish ship Ark Futura and departed the Syrian port of Latakia.
"A major landmark has been reached today," Uzumcu said, qualifying that that meant all "declared" weapons were out of the country.
"We cannot say for sure it has no more chemical weapons," Uzumcu said. "All we can do is work on the basis of verifying a country's declarations of what they have. I would not make any speculation to possible remaining assets, substances, chemical weapons. ... "
It has been more than a year since the Obama administration said that Syria had crossed a "red line" with its use of chemical weapons during the nation's civil war, which has raged since 2011.
In August 2013, U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky told reporters that a team of experts had gathered to go to Syria to investigate reports of chemical weapons. Later that month, video and witness accounts appeared to support the allegations that scores of people killed outside the Syrian capital of Damascus had been poisoned with chemical weapons. The nonpartisan Doctors Without Borders then reported that three hospitals near Damascus treated more than 3,000 patients suffering "neurotoxic symptoms."