Iraqi forces use tear gas in Baghdad as protests continue - Al Jazeera English

Security forces in Iraq have fired tear gas to disperse protesters in the capital, Baghdad, before a planned march on parliament where the government is set to hold an emergency session to discuss the resumption of deadly demonstrations. 

Despite the police's effort to clear them, hundreds of protesters dug in around Baghdad's Tahrir Square on Saturday, demanding Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi's government resign over corruption, mass unemployment and poor public services. 

Al Jazeera's Natasha Ghoneim, reporting from the protest site, said the mood in Baghdad was tense after security forces opened fire on demonstrators in the capital and several southern cities on the previous day, killing at least 42 people. 

"People here are furious. Some are trying to storm barricades leading to the Green Zone, where government offices and the parliament building are located," she said.

"They want the government to go. Security forces are using lots of tear gas and stun grenades."

There were calls for fresh protests in the south as well despite authorities announcing curfews across several provinces on Saturday. 

Legislators are scheduled to meet at the parliament at 1:00 pm (10:00 GMT) to "discuss protesters' demands, cabinet's decisions and the implementation of reforms". 

Iraqi protesters gather on the capital Baghdad's Al-Jumhuriyah Bridge on Saturday [AFP]

The Iraqi commission for human rights said the death toll from Friday's protests stood at 42. It said more than 2,300 people were wounded. 

The Interior Ministry, meanwhile, praised what it called the restraint shown by security forces on Friday.

"The security forces secured the protection of demonstrations and protesters responsibly and with high restraint, by refraining from using firearms or excessive force against demonstrators," the ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

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The unrest came three weeks after an earlier bout of rallies, in which more than 150 people were killed in a crackdown by security forces.

People gathered at the Tahrir Square said they were struggling to make sense of what they called the security forces' excessive use of force, claiming all they carried on them were flags and water to fight off tear gas and rinse their eyes.

"Just yesterday, we lost more than 30 men ... We need a safe country," said Batoul, a 21-year-old protester.

"We want to have a life literally. It's not about jobs or money, it's about being in a good country that we deserve. We have a great country but not a great government," she told Al Jazeera.

Anti-government protesters gather for a demonstration in Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday [Hadi Mizban/ AP]

Another protester decried perceived corruption and cronyism in the country.

"It's enough - theft, looting, gangs, mafias, deep state, whatever. Get out! Let us see a (functioning) state," he told AFP news agency, as puffs of smoke from tear gas rose behind him.

The ongoing turmoil has broken nearly two years of relative stability in Iraq, which in recent years has endured an invasion by the United States and protracted fighting, including against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS) armed group.

The demonstrations have posed the biggest challenge yet to the year-old government of Abdul Mahdi, who has pledged to address demonstrators' grievances by reshuffling his cabinet and delivering a package of reforms.

The moves have done little to quell the demonstrators, however, whose ire is focused not just on Abdul Mahdi's administration but also Iraq's wider political establishment, which they say has failed to improve the lives of the country's citizens.

Dozens killed as anti-government protests grip Iraq (2:29)

Many view the political elite as subservient to one or other of Iraq's two main allies, the US and Iran - powers they believe are more concerned with wielding regional influence than ordinary Iraqis' needs.

Nearly three-fifths of Iraq's 40 million people live on less than six dollars a day, World Bank figures show, despite the country housing the world's fifth-largest proven reserves of oil.

Sami Hamdi, editor-in-chief of the UK-based International Interest magazine, said Iraq had seen similar mass protests in the past, but they had dissipated because of a lack of leadership. 

"And the other dynamic that many or not talking about, which painful to say, is that Iraqi society is itself very divided. Many Iraqi voted in elections across sectarian lines, and therefore it produced a sectarian government. These parties rewarded their loyalists with public sector jobs," he said. 

"While the protesters are united over their basic rights, they are not united over who should give it to them."

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2019-10-26 11:26:00Z
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Japan floods: Death toll reaches 10 after heavy rain and landslides - BBC News

Heavy rain in eastern and northeastern Japan has led to the deaths of 10 people.

Chiba and Fukushima prefectures have been affected by torrential rain and landslides, with a months worth of rain falling in half a day in some areas.

It comes just weeks after Typhoon Hagbis left almost 80 dead and caused widespread damage.

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2019-10-26 10:25:54Z
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Lebanon protests are rare show of unity among often-divided public - NBCNews.com

BEIRUT — In a country defined by sectarian divisions, in which every discernible group flies its own flag, the sea of young people waving Lebanese flags in downtown Beirut is an arresting sight.

"Revolution, revolution," goes one chant emerging from the blur of red, white and green.

Prompted by new proposed taxes, the burgeoning protest movement demanding that the country's leaders stand down is amorphous, leaderless and overwhelmingly young. These are people who feel left out of the economy, with unemployment rates for those under 25 at 30 to 40 percent.

Oct. 23, 201901:57

Many of those who spoke to NBC News this past week on the streets of Beirut, Lebanon's capital, said recent plans to levy taxes on calls on internet services like WhatsApp had jolted them into action, but their anger at government corruption and economic mismanagement has been building for years.

No one person told these young people to come here, and yet many of those who have turned up in front of the Mohammad al-Amin mosque in central Beirut have done so every day for over a week.

There is a sense of joy at the largely peaceful protest, as it marks a rare show of unity among Lebanon’s often-divided public, with people from different religions and sects finding common cause united under the Lebanese flag.

It’s the first time people have come together "from all over Lebanon, all over the cities, different religious groups, different sects, and it’s the first time that they don’t have a leader here, which is actually more dangerous for the country,” said Leil Fouladkar, who carried a sign that ribbed both her parents and the country.

Leil Fouladkar, an aspiring film producer, protesting in Beirut.Gabe Joselow / NBC News

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What started as anti-government demonstrations on Oct. 17 has spread into a nationwide revolt, with people across Lebanon flooding public squares, blocking roads and leaving banks and schools shuttered. It has left much of the small Mediterranean country paralyzed.

Many of those protesting in downtown Beirut are from the country's expansive diaspora, and their aim is to oust the ruling elite.

“This was an unexpected grassroots movement focused on rejecting corruption, corruption that forced my father to leave this country — I am a diaspora child,” said Georges Chlouk, one of the demonstrators.

Chlouk was not the only one to remark that people are Lebanon's No. 1 export. Families have been forced to go overseas to make ends meet, while in Lebanon not a day goes by without massive power outages as trash has slowly piled up on the streets over the years, spilling into the Mediterranean Sea.

Lebanon’s president has pleaded with the protesters to back sweeping economic reforms proposed by Prime Minister Saad Hariri as the “first step” toward saving the country from economic collapse.

Oct. 22, 201900:26

The reforms include cutting in half the salaries of top officials, including legislators and members of Parliament, as well as abolishing several state institutions, according to The Associated Press. The government will also give millions of dollars to families living in poverty, as well as $160 million in housing loans.

But the protesters have already rejected the prime minister's initiative and are demanding a much greater overhaul. Many are asking if the country's Constitution, heavily amended after the 15-year civil war ended in 1990, is modern enough and still appropriate.

Ali Mazur, a doctor who, at 45, was one of the older protesters, rejected this sort of reading of the movement.

“The president must be a Christian, the chief of Parliament must be Shiite and prime minister must be Sunni,and this is the problem," he said, referring to Lebanon’s sectarian-based leaders. "We have to bring down this system to be civilized.”

But Lebanon is far from united in opposing the government.

Supporters of Iran-backed Hezbollah and the Shiite Amal movement, which is closely allied with Hezbollah, have tried to disrupt the protests. And Hezbollah has said it is against a change of government.

Lebanese riot policemen stand guard on a road leading to the government palace, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday. Hussein Malla / AP

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said Friday that Lebanon was being "targeted" internationally and regionally, and he expressed fear that someone was looking to plunge the country into another civil war.

As prime minister, Hariri heads a national unity government that includes the militant Shiite group.

The Hezbollah supporters were cut off by the army and physically turned around, highlighting the shift in the army’s approach to political upheaval.

In the past, the Lebanese army has tried to stay out of politics almost at any cost. In 2008 gunfire rattled across the Lebanese capital when Hezbollah stormed the Western part of the city and occupied it for months. The army returned to its barracks, not wanting to step into the fray.

This time they are standing their ground, protecting the protesters.

Cal Perry and Gabe Joselow reported from Beirut. Saphora Smith reported from London.

Gabe Joselow

Gabe Joselow is a multimedia producer at NBC News.

Saphora Smith

Saphora Smith is a London-based reporter for NBC News Digital. 

Associated Press contributed.

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2019-10-26 08:33:00Z
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The UK has messed up Brexit. Now Boris Johnson is trapped in hell - CNN International

That date can change, and Brussels may well grant a third extension beyond October 31. This would stop the UK crashing out of the bloc at the end of the month. But it would do nothing to calm the mayhem, nastiness and confusion that has engulfed Westminster for three years.

Johnson says he will ask for an early election on Monday -- the third time in his short premiership that he has made this request. Yet there is no political consensus over when this election should happen. So the UK will keep limping forward, with no one able to break the deadlock or provide any clarity for an exhausted public.

It didn't need to have been like this. Looking back at the last three years, it's easy to pinpoint the errors that made delivering Brexit on time impossible.

Rewind to June 24, 2016. David Cameron resigned as Prime Minister, having campaigned to remain in the EU and lost.

That triggered a leadership contest that many thought was an open goal for Boris Johnson. He'd led the successful Leave campaign and had a team of Brexit disciples ready in place. Unfortunately for Johnson, one of his team didn't think he was up to the job. The man at his side for the referendum campaign, Michael Gove, shocked the nation when he stood against Johnson. This tanked both men's campaigns and paved the way for Theresa May to lead the nation.

Just weeks after the referendum, this might have been when things first started going wrong for Brexit. May had campaigned to remain in the EU. She needed to prove her credentials as a born-again Brexiteer. She didn't try to build a consensus or engage with the EU on a way for the UK to leave. Instead, she marched around the country regurgitating meaningless statements like "Brexit means Brexit," "no deal is better than a bad deal," and declaring that she didn't want a hard or a soft Brexit, but a "red, white and blue Brexit."

Underestimating the EU

As Georgina Wright, an EU expert at the Institute for Government explains, the UK ignored the reality of how Brexit talks would go. "As a big EU member state, the UK could essentially call the shots. If it agreed with a Commission policy, it would say so loudly at the EU Council. If it disagreed, it could say so even louder and build coalitions with other like-minded member states. That was obviously never going to work with Brexit. The UK would be sitting on the other side of the table with 27 member states opposite," Wright said.

Meanwhile, Brussels was getting its house in order. It appointed Michel Barnier as its chief negotiator and employed a team around him. Back in London, rather than starting negotiations, May cracked on with her Brexit evangelism.

Triggering Article 50

On March 29, 2017, May triggered Article 50, the formal notification of a nation's intention to leave the EU. No formal negotiations had taken place and no Brexit plan existed.

One of the biggest critics of this decision was Dominic Cummings, the man who pulled the strings of the Leave campaign and now works as Johnson's most senior political adviser. At the time, he wrote on his personal blog that by not having any plan or agreement in place with the EU, "the government has irretrievably botched this."

A senior Downing Street aide pointed CNN toward the Vote Leave campaign's policy on Article 50, as stated back in 2016. Vote Leave said the way forward would be to agree "a new UK-EU Treaty based on free trade and friendly cooperation." They even went so far as to claim, "We do not necessarily have to use Article 50 -- we may agree with the EU another path that is in both our interests."

In an alternative reality, the implication here is that a Johnson government would have started negotiating with the EU from day one, possibly putting contentious issues like the divorce bill and EU citizen rights to bed. This, the aide claims, would have set a much more pleasant tone for negotiations than the tense atmosphere created by May's team.

An election backfires

After triggering Article 50, May determined that instead of heading to Brussels to open talks, a better use of everyone's time would be a snap election. Her logic was that she needed a huge majority to ram through her Brexit plan.

However, as polls closed on June 8, 2017, it soon became clear that this plan had badly backfired. May lost her slim majority in Parliament after alienating both remain voters and those who favored a softer Brexit. And with negotiations in Brussels due to start just days later, she needed a lifeline.

Rather than working on a cross-party basis to create a solution, May cut a deal with the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and its 10 MPs. The DUP supports Brexit but -- more than anything -- wants to ensure that Northern Ireland remains in the UK at any cost. More on this later.

Reality dawns

Brexit talks finally started in Brussels on June 19, 2017. It's fair to say that they didn't go terribly well. As one EU source recalls, from day one "the UK had problems with the financial settlement, the role of the ECJ (European Court of Justice), the need for a backstop in Ireland and the sequencing of the talks."

The EU insisted that these issues were settled, and the concerns of its member states and institutions were secure, before even discussing any kind of free trade deal or future relationship. As the Brexit realities dawned on May, she rubbed out nearly all of her own red lines, and closed in on a deal with the EU in November 2018. May's concessions to the EU cost her two Brexit secretaries and, most importantly, her Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson.

It also cost her the support of the DUP, who believed May had sold them out in securing a deal.

Without the support of the hard-line Brexiteers or the DUP, May's deal was dead on arrival. By keeping the details of the agreement so quiet throughout the process, she arguably made the sting of her perceived betrayals more painful. And the deal's multiple defeats in Parliament, after months of negotiations, shook the EU's confidence in any promise made by the UK.

May's failure made her resignation certain. And from the second she announced her plan to step down, something else became inevitable: the coronation of Johnson as Prime Minister.

Setting the bar too high

The boy who dreamed of being "world king" began his premiership by employing key players from the Vote Leave team -- most notably, Dominic Cummings.

The Brexit victors thought they could sweep aside May's failures and get on with their optimistic vision. What they didn't bank on was just how poisoned a chalice May had handed over.

Parliament had been at each other's throats for months. The public was tired, bored and more divided than in 2016. As a result, Johnson leaned into a much harder Brexit stance. He said he'd get Brexit done, "do or die," by October 31. He promised to get rid of the Irish backstop mechanism that helped doom May's deal. He said he'd secure a new deal. He swore he'd rather be "dead in a ditch" than request another extension. And he told the DUP that he would do nothing that harmed the union.

Johnson set the bar too high. And, ultimately, he found he was going to have to throw someone under a bus. When he returned from Brussels with a surprise new deal earlier this month, the DUP told the PM that his deal was even worse than May's.

Privately, some DUP MPs now express regret for not backing May's deal. It might have left Northern Ireland tied to the EU, but it also tied it to the rest of the UK. Johnson's deal does the one thing the DUP insisted against: it makes a special case for Northern Ireland, meaning it deviates from the rest of the UK.

Mired in confusion

Without DUP support, with the backing of more liberal Conservatives long gone, and with no serious cross-party talks to speak of, Johnson is stuck.

Parliament doesn't trust Johnson. The Prime Minister cannot do anything without the consent of Parliament. The EU is getting sick of granting Brexit extensions only for the UK to waste time. Even an election could result in more confusion.

There is no clear evidence that any single party can secure a majority. An election would likely result in another minority Conservative government or a coalition between the main opposition parties, all of whom hate one another and don't agree on a way forward.

There is no easy fix to the Brexit crisis that doesn't make it all worse. Two Prime Ministers and various opposition figures have made promises they cannot keep. It's left the nation horribly divided and seemingly with no way out.

Brexit is supposed to be done next Thursday. In reality we will probably still be talking about this for months, if not years, from now.

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https://edition.cnn.com/2019/10/26/uk/brexit-was-not-meant-to-be-like-this-analysis-intl-gbr/index.html

2019-10-26 08:32:38Z
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Trump decided to leave troops in Syria after conversations about oil, officials say - The Washington Post

Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Oct. 25 that the United States would maintain a ‘reduced presence’ in Syria, in a partial reversal of President Trump’s withdrawal.

President Trump was persuaded to leave at least several hundred troops behind in Syria only when he was told that his decision to pull them out would risk control of oil fields in the country’s east, according to U.S. officials.

Trump had rejected arguments that withdrawing U.S. forces would benefit American adversaries, while endangering civilians and Kurdish allies, but he tweeted Thursday that “we will NEVER let a reconstituted ISIS have those fields.”

Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper confirmed on Friday that troops would remain in eastern Syria to prevent the oil fields from being retaken by the Islamic State.

Speaking at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Esper said that military planners were “considering how we might reposition forces in the areas” and that the deployment “would include some mechanized forces” such as tanks or other armored vehicles and support personnel.

A U.S. official with knowledge of operations in Syria said that Trump’s interest in the oil provided an opportunity for the Pentagon, which was unhappy with the initial decision, to temper his insistence on a full withdrawal and allow counterterrorism operations and airspace control to continue.

“This is like feeding a baby its medicine in yogurt or applesauce,” said the official, one of several who spoke on the condition of anonymity about internal U.S. deliberations.

One senior NATO diplomat said Esper offered few details about the new deployment during the NATO meeting.

“He’s trying to elaborate on Trump’s intuitions,” the diplomat said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door discussions. “It’s hard.”

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a Trump ally who had called the withdrawal decision a major blunder, pressed the case for controlling the oil fields during a Thursday lunch with the president.

“He sees the benefit … of controlling the oil as part of a counter-ISIS strategy,” Graham said in an interview.

Trump has declared the militant caliphate “100 percent” defeated, although U.S. officials have said that thousands of Islamic State fighters remain in Syria.

The eastern oil fields in Deir al-Zour province, where most of Syria’s relatively small and low-quality reserves are located, were once the primary source of income for the militants, who sold the oil to the Syrian government, Turkey and, reportedly, even to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Massive U.S. and coalition air bombardments, beginning in 2015, drove the Islamic State either underground or away from the area. Since then, the SDF has controlled it, in the presence of about 200 U.S. troops. According to people familiar with the operations, the SDF has continued selling the oil on the black market — largely to the Syrian government.

The desert region is far from major Kurdish areas in Syria, which lie along the northern border. Hundreds of thousands of Kurdish civilians have been driven south, and east into Iraq, by Turkish troops and their Syrian Arab allies that have pushed at least 20 miles into Syria.

Another U.S. official said the latest plan calls for several hundred troops, but “less than a battalion,” spread across the region at several locations between the towns of Hasakah and Deir al-Zour. A battalion in most U.S. military units includes 800 to 1,000 troops.

The official said these forces would be in addition to those already there, with the result conceivably approaching the 1,000 Trump initially ordered withdrawn.

The introduction of tanks or Bradley Fighting Vehicles — which flanked Trump during his July 4 speech in Washington and cost less to operate — are a “symbolic move with tactical benefits,” the official said.

Among those benefits are long-range optics that can help detect enemy forces and the ability to maneuver over uneven terrain that other vehicles struggle with, the official said. But above all, they show firepower, the official said. There are about 12 to 15 tanks or Bradleys in each company possessing them.

Trump announced the U.S. pullout from Syria after yielding to the Turkish invasion. Turkey had demanded that the SDF, whose Kurdish leaders it considers terrorists allied with Kurdish separatists in Turkey, abandon the border region.

But the northern rim has also been the main ground supply route for U.S. forces in Syria, including those in the Deir al-Zour province where they are now to remain to guard Syria’s largest oil field.

The area is remote and inaccessible except by three border crossings from Iraq, two of which are controlled by Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq. The main crossing at Fishkhabour is in the far northeast corner of Syria, inside an area now claimed for the Syrian government under an agreement signed this week by Turkey and Russia, Assad’s main ally.

One U.S. official said that for now, the military has continued to run ground resupply convoys into Syria from Iraq through the Fishkhabour crossing this week, deconflicting with Russian forces as necessary.

Access to any of the crossings also requires permission from the government of Iraq, which last week said that U.S. forces being evacuated there from Syria could only remain for four weeks.

Even if the border crossings could be negotiated with Russia, Syria, Iraq and the militias — depending on who is in charge at a given time and place — road access to the scattered and relatively small U.S. outposts around the main Omar oil field remains insecure and difficult along desert tracks and dirt roads, according to several people with knowledge of the area.

While larger U.S. installations — many now abandoned — had been clustered in Kurdish areas closer to the Turkish border, the American presence in the more sparsely populated areas to the south has been light, said Nicholas A. Heras, a scholar who tracks Syria at the Center for a New American Security. Maintaining and protecting troops in isolated areas of Deir al-Zour will be a challenge, he said.

“The United States is dependent on the SDF, and the devil will be in the details” of any arrangement, Heras said.

If the United States cannot maintain a land route into Syria, it may have to expand a small airfield in the Deir al-Zour region or a base at Rmeilan, just south of the Turkish expansion area in northeast Syria. The base was the second-largest U.S. facility after the border town of Kobane, now occupied by Russian and other forces, and the only one capable of receiving large cargo aircraft, Heras said.

The U.S. mission shift to protecting oil fields could also raise issues in Congress.

The Pentagon operates in Syria under the long-standing Authorization for Use of Military Force, passed by lawmakers in the wake of terrorist attacks in September 2001 to target “nations, organizations, or persons” who were involved and to prevent “future acts of international terrorism.”

While the Obama and Trump administrations have argued that the authorization allows action against the Islamic State, the Syrian regime also wants the oil fields. In February 2018, U.S. forces used airstrikes and artillery to kill more than 100 advancing Russian mercenaries and Syrian forces advancing in the area after commanders determined that U.S. troops on the ground there were in danger.

Esper’s announcement in Brussels capped two days of discussions at NATO headquarters that were dominated by anger directed at Turkey, a member of the alliance, for invading Syria.

Turkey’s agreement with Russia to jointly send in troops to the region to fill the vacuum created by the U.S. withdrawal has also caused heartburn at NATO. The alliance spends much of its energy countering threats from the Kremlin, and many fear the increased instability in Syria has been a gift to Russia.

“Recent events in Syria gave bonuses to the Russian side, which is neither in Turkey’s nor in NATO’s interest,” said Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks.

Lithuanian Defense Minister Raimundas Karoblis expressed similar views. “We are not very enthusiastic when we see Russians on former U.S. bases,” he said. “The alliance should not give gifts to a strategic competitor.”

But NATO has little recourse to take action against Turkey. The organization’s rules do not allow members to be kicked out, nor is it a venue for sanctions to be imposed. Individual members have broad power to put holds on decisions. And many NATO members still calculate that, even though Turkey can be a frustrating ally, their own security is still improved with it inside.

Birnbaum reported from Brussels. Josh Dawsey in Washington contributed to this report.

Read more:

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

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2019-10-26 05:12:00Z
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Trump decided to leave troops in Syria after conversations about oil, officials say - The Washington Post

Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Oct. 25 that the United States would maintain a ‘reduced presence’ in Syria, in a partial reversal of President Trump’s withdrawal.

President Trump was persuaded to leave at least several hundred troops behind in Syria only when he was told that his decision to pull them out would risk control of oil fields in the country’s east, according to U.S. officials.

Trump had rejected arguments that withdrawing U.S. forces would benefit American adversaries, while endangering civilians and Kurdish allies, but he tweeted Thursday that “we will NEVER let a reconstituted ISIS have those fields.”

Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper confirmed on Friday that troops would remain in eastern Syria to prevent the oil fields from being retaken by the Islamic State.

Speaking at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Esper said that military planners were “considering how we might reposition forces in the areas” and that the deployment “would include some mechanized forces” such as tanks or other armored vehicles and support personnel.

A U.S. official with knowledge of operations in Syria said that Trump’s interest in the oil provided an opportunity for the Pentagon, which was unhappy with the initial decision, to temper his insistence on a full withdrawal and allow counterterrorism operations and airspace control to continue.

“This is like feeding a baby its medicine in yogurt or applesauce,” said the official, one of several who spoke on the condition of anonymity about internal U.S. deliberations.

One senior NATO diplomat said Esper offered few details about the new deployment during the NATO meeting.

“He’s trying to elaborate on Trump’s intuitions,” the diplomat said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door discussions. “It’s hard.”

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a Trump ally who had called the withdrawal decision a major blunder, pressed the case for controlling the oil fields during a Thursday lunch with the president.

“He sees the benefit … of controlling the oil as part of a counter-ISIS strategy,” Graham said in an interview.

Trump has declared the militant caliphate “100 percent” defeated, although U.S. officials have said that thousands of Islamic State fighters remain in Syria.

The eastern oil fields in Deir al-Zour province, where most of Syria’s relatively small and low-quality reserves are located, were once the primary source of income for the militants, who sold the oil to the Syrian government, Turkey and, reportedly, even to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Massive U.S. and coalition air bombardments, beginning in 2015, drove the Islamic State either underground or away from the area. Since then, the SDF has controlled it, in the presence of about 200 U.S. troops. According to people familiar with the operations, the SDF has continued selling the oil on the black market — largely to the Syrian government.

The desert region is far from major Kurdish areas in Syria, which lie along the northern border. Hundreds of thousands of Kurdish civilians have been driven south, and east into Iraq, by Turkish troops and their Syrian Arab allies that have pushed at least 20 miles into Syria.

Another U.S. official said the latest plan calls for several hundred troops, but “less than a battalion,” spread across the region at several locations between the towns of Hasakah and Deir al-Zour. A battalion in most U.S. military units includes 800 to 1,000 troops.

The official said these forces would be in addition to those already there, with the result conceivably approaching the 1,000 Trump initially ordered withdrawn.

The introduction of tanks or Bradley Fighting Vehicles — which flanked Trump during his July 4 speech in Washington and cost less to operate — are a “symbolic move with tactical benefits,” the official said.

Among those benefits are long-range optics that can help detect enemy forces and the ability to maneuver over uneven terrain that other vehicles struggle with, the official said. But above all, they show firepower, the official said. There are about 12 to 15 tanks or Bradleys in each company possessing them.

Trump announced the U.S. pullout from Syria after yielding to the Turkish invasion. Turkey had demanded that the SDF, whose Kurdish leaders it considers terrorists allied with Kurdish separatists in Turkey, abandon the border region.

But the northern rim has also been the main ground supply route for U.S. forces in Syria, including those in the Deir al-Zour province where they are now to remain to guard Syria’s largest oil field.

The area is remote and inaccessible except by three border crossings from Iraq, two of which are controlled by Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq. The main crossing at Fishkhabour is in the far northeast corner of Syria, inside an area now claimed for the Syrian government under an agreement signed this week by Turkey and Russia, Assad’s main ally.

One U.S. official said that for now, the military has continued to run ground resupply convoys into Syria from Iraq through the Fishkhabour crossing this week, deconflicting with Russian forces as necessary.

Access to any of the crossings also requires permission from the government of Iraq, which last week said that U.S. forces being evacuated there from Syria could only remain for four weeks.

Even if the border crossings could be negotiated with Russia, Syria, Iraq and the militias — depending on who is in charge at a given time and place — road access to the scattered and relatively small U.S. outposts around the main Omar oil field remains insecure and difficult along desert tracks and dirt roads, according to several people with knowledge of the area.

While larger U.S. installations — many now abandoned — had been clustered in Kurdish areas closer to the Turkish border, the American presence in the more sparsely populated areas to the south has been light, said Nicholas A. Heras, a scholar who tracks Syria at the Center for a New American Security. Maintaining and protecting troops in isolated areas of Deir al-Zour will be a challenge, he said.

“The United States is dependent on the SDF, and the devil will be in the details” of any arrangement, Heras said.

If the United States cannot maintain a land route into Syria, it may have to expand a small airfield in the Deir al-Zour region or a base at Rmeilan, just south of the Turkish expansion area in northeast Syria. The base was the second-largest U.S. facility after the border town of Kobane, now occupied by Russian and other forces, and the only one capable of receiving large cargo aircraft, Heras said.

The U.S. mission shift to protecting oil fields could also raise issues in Congress.

The Pentagon operates in Syria under the long-standing Authorization for Use of Military Force, passed by lawmakers in the wake of terrorist attacks in September 2001 to target “nations, organizations, or persons” who were involved and to prevent “future acts of international terrorism.”

While the Obama and Trump administrations have argued that the authorization allows action against the Islamic State, the Syrian regime also wants the oil fields. In February 2018, U.S. forces used airstrikes and artillery to kill more than 100 advancing Russian mercenaries and Syrian forces advancing in the area after commanders determined that U.S. troops on the ground there were in danger.

Esper’s announcement in Brussels capped two days of discussions at NATO headquarters that were dominated by anger directed at Turkey, a member of the alliance, for invading Syria.

Turkey’s agreement with Russia to jointly send in troops to the region to fill the vacuum created by the U.S. withdrawal has also caused heartburn at NATO. The alliance spends much of its energy countering threats from the Kremlin, and many fear the increased instability in Syria has been a gift to Russia.

“Recent events in Syria gave bonuses to the Russian side, which is neither in Turkey’s nor in NATO’s interest,” said Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks.

Lithuanian Defense Minister Raimundas Karoblis expressed similar views. “We are not very enthusiastic when we see Russians on former U.S. bases,” he said. “The alliance should not give gifts to a strategic competitor.”

But NATO has little recourse to take action against Turkey. The organization’s rules do not allow members to be kicked out, nor is it a venue for sanctions to be imposed. Individual members have broad power to put holds on decisions. And many NATO members still calculate that, even though Turkey can be a frustrating ally, their own security is still improved with it inside.

Birnbaum reported from Brussels. Josh Dawsey in Washington contributed to this report.

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2019-10-26 04:22:02Z
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Trump decided to leave troops in Syria after conversations about oil, officials say - The Washington Post

Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Oct. 25 that the United States would maintain a ‘reduced presence’ in Syria, in a partial reversal of President Trump’s withdrawal.

President Trump was persuaded to leave at least several hundred troops behind in Syria only when he was told that his decision to pull them out would risk control of oil fields in the country’s east, according to U.S. officials.

Trump had rejected arguments that withdrawing U.S. forces would benefit American adversaries, while endangering civilians and Kurdish allies, but he tweeted Thursday that “we will NEVER let a reconstituted ISIS have those fields.”

Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper confirmed on Friday that troops would remain in eastern Syria to prevent the oil fields from being retaken by the Islamic State.

Speaking at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Esper said that military planners were “considering how we might reposition forces in the areas” and that the deployment “would include some mechanized forces” such as tanks or other armored vehicles and support personnel.

A U.S. official with knowledge of operations in Syria said that Trump’s interest in the oil provided an opportunity for the Pentagon, which was unhappy with the initial decision, to temper his insistence on a full withdrawal and allow counterterrorism operations and airspace control to continue.

“This is like feeding a baby its medicine in yogurt or applesauce,” said the official, one of several who spoke on the condition of anonymity about internal U.S. deliberations.

One senior NATO diplomat said Esper offered few details about the new deployment during the NATO meeting.

“He’s trying to elaborate on Trump’s intuitions,” the diplomat said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door discussions. “It’s hard.”

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a Trump ally who had called the withdrawal decision a major blunder, pressed the case for controlling the oil fields during a Thursday lunch with the president.

“He sees the benefit … of controlling the oil as part of a counter-ISIS strategy,” Graham said in an interview.

Trump has declared the militant caliphate “100 percent” defeated, although U.S. officials have said that thousands of Islamic State fighters remain in Syria.

The eastern oil fields in Deir al-Zour province, where most of Syria’s relatively small and low-quality reserves are located, were once the primary source of income for the militants, who sold the oil to the Syrian government, Turkey and, reportedly, even to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Massive U.S. and coalition air bombardments, beginning in 2015, drove the Islamic State either underground or away from the area. Since then, the SDF has controlled it, in the presence of about 200 U.S. troops. According to people familiar with the operations, the SDF has continued selling the oil on the black market — largely to the Syrian government.

The desert region is far from major Kurdish areas in Syria, which lie along the northern border. Hundreds of thousands of Kurdish civilians have been driven south, and east into Iraq, by Turkish troops and their Syrian Arab allies that have pushed at least 20 miles into Syria.

Another U.S. official said the latest plan calls for several hundred troops, but “less than a battalion,” spread across the region at several locations between the towns of Hasakah and Deir al-Zour. A battalion in most U.S. military units includes 800 to 1,000 troops.

The official said these forces would be in addition to those already there, with the result conceivably approaching the 1,000 Trump initially ordered withdrawn.

The introduction of tanks or Bradley Fighting Vehicles — which flanked Trump during his July 4 speech in Washington and cost less to operate — are a “symbolic move with tactical benefits,” the official said.

Among those benefits are long-range optics that can help detect enemy forces and the ability to maneuver over uneven terrain that other vehicles struggle with, the official said. But above all, they show firepower, the official said. There are about 12 to 15 tanks or Bradleys in each company possessing them.

Trump announced the U.S. pullout from Syria after yielding to the Turkish invasion. Turkey had demanded that the SDF, whose Kurdish leaders it considers terrorists allied with Kurdish separatists in Turkey, abandon the border region.

But the northern rim has also been the main ground supply route for U.S. forces in Syria, including those in the Deir al-Zour province where they are now to remain to guard Syria’s largest oil field.

The area is remote and inaccessible except by three border crossings from Iraq, two of which are controlled by Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq. The main crossing at Fishkhabour is in the far northeast corner of Syria, inside an area now claimed for the Syrian government under an agreement signed this week by Turkey and Russia, Assad’s main ally.

One U.S. official said that for now, the military has continued to run ground resupply convoys into Syria from Iraq through the Fishkhabour crossing this week, deconflicting with Russian forces as necessary.

Access to any of the crossings also requires permission from the government of Iraq, which last week said that U.S. forces being evacuated there from Syria could only remain for four weeks.

Even if the border crossings could be negotiated with Russia, Syria, Iraq and the militias — depending on who is in charge at a given time and place — road access to the scattered and relatively small U.S. outposts around the main Omar oil field remains insecure and difficult along desert tracks and dirt roads, according to several people with knowledge of the area.

While larger U.S. installations — many now abandoned — had been clustered in Kurdish areas closer to the Turkish border, the American presence in the more sparsely populated areas to the south has been light, said Nicholas A. Heras, a scholar who tracks Syria at the Center for a New American Security. Maintaining and protecting troops in isolated areas of Deir al-Zour will be a challenge, he said.

“The United States is dependent on the SDF, and the devil will be in the details” of any arrangement, Heras said.

If the United States cannot maintain a land route into Syria, it may have to expand a small airfield in the Deir al-Zour region or a base at Rmeilan, just south of the Turkish expansion area in northeast Syria. The base was the second-largest U.S. facility after the border town of Kobane, now occupied by Russian and other forces, and the only one capable of receiving large cargo aircraft, Heras said.

The U.S. mission shift to protecting oil fields could also raise issues in Congress.

The Pentagon operates in Syria under the long-standing Authorization for Use of Military Force, passed by lawmakers in the wake of terrorist attacks in September 2001 to target “nations, organizations, or persons” who were involved and to prevent “future acts of international terrorism.”

While the Obama and Trump administrations have argued that the authorization allows action against the Islamic State, the Syrian regime also wants the oil fields. In February 2018, U.S. forces used airstrikes and artillery to kill more than 100 advancing Russian mercenaries and Syrian forces advancing in the area after commanders determined that U.S. troops on the ground there were in danger.

Esper’s announcement in Brussels capped two days of discussions at NATO headquarters that were dominated by anger directed at Turkey, a member of the alliance, for invading Syria.

Turkey’s agreement with Russia to jointly send in troops to the region to fill the vacuum created by the U.S. withdrawal has also caused heartburn at NATO. The alliance spends much of its energy countering threats from the Kremlin, and many fear the increased instability in Syria has been a gift to Russia.

“Recent events in Syria gave bonuses to the Russian side, which is neither in Turkey’s nor in NATO’s interest,” said Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks.

Lithuanian Defense Minister Raimundas Karoblis expressed similar views. “We are not very enthusiastic when we see Russians on former U.S. bases,” he said. “The alliance should not give gifts to a strategic competitor.”

But NATO has little recourse to take action against Turkey. The organization’s rules do not allow members to be kicked out, nor is it a venue for sanctions to be imposed. Individual members have broad power to put holds on decisions. And many NATO members still calculate that, even though Turkey can be a frustrating ally, their own security is still improved with it inside.

Birnbaum reported from Brussels. Josh Dawsey in Washington contributed to this report.

Read more:

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/us-defense-secretary-mark-esper-says-us-will-leave-forces-in-syria-to-defend-oil-fields-from-islamic-state/2019/10/25/fd131f1a-f723-11e9-829d-87b12c2f85dd_story.html

2019-10-26 03:56:50Z
52780419454175