The U.S. Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, warned that the United States could follow up a military strike on a Syrian airbase with further action, in an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Friday.
The U.S. fired dozens of missiles at a Syrian airbase suspected of being the launch pad for a chemical weapons attack earlier this week that shocked observers around the world.
“The U.S. took a very measured step last night. We are prepared to do more – but we hope that is not necessary”, Haley said.
U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the missile attack in response to a presumed chemical weapons attack that he described as “an affront to humanity” carried out deliberately by the Syrian Government of President Bashar al-Assad.
Russia, who has supported al-Assad in the conflict – now in its seventh year – strongly, condemned the U.S. strike.
It was “based on the predetermination that Syria was guilty’’, Russia’s Deputy UN Ambassador, Vladimir Safronkov, said at the public UN meeting in New York.
He echoed remarks by President Vladimir Putin, who described the U.S. strike earlier as a violation of international law and called it an “aggression against a sovereign country’’, according to comments his spokesman relayed to state media.
Safronkov also criticised the Security Council’s investigative arm, and told British UN Ambassador Matthew Rycroft “you are afraid of a real independent investigation.”
Rycroft had described the strikes as a “proportionate response to unspeakable acts.”
Trump, however, believes the attack was proportionate and had been well received by the global community, his Spokesman Sean Spicer said.
Spicer said the U.S. had sent a “very clear message” with the strikes.
“First and foremost, the Syrian Government, the Assad regime, at the minimum should abide by the agreement they made not to use chemical weapons”, Spicer said in Florida.
The U.S. military is also looking into whether Syria had help from Russia in carrying out Tuesday’s chemical weapons attack in Syria, according to a Pentagon official.
“Russia at the minimum failed to rein in the activity”, the official said.
Russia vowed earlier on Friday to strengthen Syria’s air defenses following the U.S. strike.
More than 50 Tomahawk missiles were launched from two U.S. warships in the eastern Mediterranean Sea at the Shayrat airbase, the Pentagon said earlier.
The Syrian military said that at least six people were killed and heavy damage was inflicted on the airbase.
Another nine civilians, including four children, were killed by missiles that fell in villages near the base, in the central province of Homs, Syrian State News Agency SANA reported.
The Pentagon said that it could not confirm any casualties.
On Tuesday, more than 80 people were killed in the chemical weapons incident in the rebel town of Khan Sheikhoun in the province of Idlib, leading to widespread international outrage.
The heightened tension between the U.S. and Russia comes just days before U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is scheduled to visit Moscow for talks with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.
The airstrikes also overshadowed a second day of talks between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. (dpa/NAN)