Iran’s foreign minister has slammed potential US-led air strikes against Syria as illegal; US ambassador to the United Nations criticises the UN Security Council for its failure to condemn Syria
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    • According to reports, Iran’s foreign minister has slammed potential US-led airstrikes against Syria as “illegal” on a visit to Baghdad on September 8, while his Iraqi counterpart warned they would hinder efforts towards a political solution. Mohammad Javed Zarif said military action was barred under the United Nations charter, but Washington is pressing for the strikes in response to an alleged chemical weapons attack the White House says was carried out by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. “Civilized countries, 65 years ago, took the options off the table when they rejected in the charter of the United Nations resort to force as an illegal practice,” Zarif said, speaking in English at a joint press conference with Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari. Zarif made these remarks during a one-day trip to Iraq, his first since being appointed foreign minister by President Hassan Rowhani in mid-August, and after meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki earlier on September 8. 1
    In another development, according to reports, US ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power on September 6, delivered a strong rebuke to the UN Security Council for its failure to condemn Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons against his own people. Power also said that the United States has all but given up on any political solution to the Syrian civil war that isn’t brought about by the use of American arms to force the Assad regime to the negotiating table. Over the past year the United States has repeatedly reached out to the Assad regime both directly and though proxies like Russia, the United Nations, and even Iran to seek a diplomatic solution she said, but the Assad regime has ignored or rejected the overtures. Speaking at the Center for American Progress in Washington, Power said that “we have exhausted the alternatives” short of war, and given the UN Security Council’s refusal to act it is up to the US to “employ limited military means to achieve very specific ends — to degrade Assad’s capacity to use these weapons again, and deter others in the world who might follow suit.” 2

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