Russia Doubts Full U.S. Withdrawal From Syria

Date: 09 January 2019 - 21:46

News ID: ۶۱۸۵۰

MOSCOW (Dispatches) – Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said Wednesday it was hard to believe that the United States would pull out of Syria completely under the current circumstances, given the strong position of those who support the continued U.S. military presence in the Arab Republic.
"I believe the positions of those who want to maintain U.S. military presence in Syria — illegal, breaching the international law — are quite strong in Washington… I cannot imagine that the United States will fully and indisputably leave Syria in terms of physical military presence in the current situation where Washington is locked in unstoppable contest for world domination and driven to be present everywhere and resolve issues only on its own conditions," the diplomat told reporters.
The contacts on Syria between Russia and the United States do not stop even if they are not always announced, there are no long pauses in the talks, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said Wednesday.
"The contacts on various aspects of the situation in Syria do not stop… These contacts are not always announced; if the information on them becomes widely available, they attract additional attention. But the contacts are ongoing on various issues. There will be contacts on other topics in the near future… The breaks in the contacts may be different, but there are no long pauses," the diplomat told reporters.
Earlier, U.S. President Donald Trump said that the United States would withdraw its troops from Syria because the Daesh terrorist group had been defeated in Syria.
The U.S.-led coalition of over 70 countries has been carrying out airstrikes in Syria on a regular basis on the pretext of assisting the SDF in its fight against the Daesh terrorist group.
Moscow would like to resume a meaningful dialogue on arms control with the United States in the near future, Sergey Ryabkov said.
"We would like to resume a meaningful dialogue on arms control as well in the near future. We are working on it, too. Perhaps, something will come out of it, but we cannot announce any schedules or agreed events yet," Ryabkov told reporters.
The diplomat confirmed that Russia was ready to discuss missiles with Washington.