The US on Thursday accused Syria of stonewalling a UN probe of the murder of Lebanon's former prime minister and condemned an "appalling" speech by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Assad, in a fiery hour-long speech to the nation in Damascus, lashed out at the Lebanese government and accused its prime minister of kowtowing to Western countries.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Syria was still failing to cooperate fully with the UN probe of the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri.
Speaking in Shannon, Ireland, en route to the Middle East, Rice criticized Syria for its response to the investigation conducted by German magistrate Detlev Mehlis for the UN.
"I don't think this constitutes cooperation," she said. "The [UN] resolution couldn't have been clearer and in fact more detailed about what was expected of the Syrians. They're expected to answer affirmatively, positively, yes, to whatever Mehlis needs to complete his investigation."
Rice was commenting on Syria's announcement on Wednesday that it had invited Mehlis to sign a cooperation accord on the probe into the Feb. 14 assassination of Hariri in a massive bomb blast in Beirut.
The UN Security Council adopted three resolutions concerning Syria, the most recent of them (Resolution 1636) calling for Damascus's complete cooperation with the Mehlis assassination probe.
Meanwhile, the US State Department slammed as "appalling" Assad's speech at Damascus University in which he defended his country's innocence in the Hariri case.
"We saw the speech. We think it's appalling," said State Department spokesman Adam Ereli. "Assad's remarks today can only be seen as a defiance of those [UN] resolutions."
"Let's remember, first of all, that the international community has made it clear to Syria that it must first fully cooperate with the Mehlis investigation and, second, cease all interference in Lebanese domestic affairs," Ereli said.
In his speech, Assad declared: "I always said Syria is innocent. ... Syria is not implicated."
But he added: "Whatever we do or say to cooperate, the response is just going to be in a month that Syria is not cooperating. We have to be realistic. Syria is being targeted."
Assad vowed, however, that Damascus, despite its distrust of the process, would fully cooperate with the UN probe.
He lashed out at the Lebanese government which swept to power to replace their pro-Syrian predecessors in the aftermath of the murder, calling Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora a "slave of his masters."
"We asked Siniora to work to preserve good relations with Lebanon but some of those who are in power are hostile to Syria and accept that their country serves as a passage point for plots," Assad said.
Assad's speech prompted a walkout from a Lebanese Cabinet meeting of five Shiite ministers in protest of Siniora's insistence on discussing Assad's speech.
Separately, the US called for the unconditional release of a Syrian opposition figure as well as other critics of Assad's regime.
When a hiker fell from a 55m waterfall in wild New Zealand bush, rescuers were forced to evacuate the badly hurt woman without her dog, which could not be found. After strangers raised thousands of dollars for a search, border collie Molly was flown to safety by a helicopter pilot who was determined to reunite the pet and the owner. A week earlier, an emergency rescue helicopter found the woman with bruises and lacerations after a fall at a rocky spot at the waterfall on the South Island’s West Coast. She was airlifted on March 24, but they were forced to
HIGH HOPES: The power source is expected to have a future, as it is not dependent on the weather or light, and could be useful for places with large desalination facilities A Japanese water plant is harnessing the natural process of osmosis to generate renewable energy that could one day become a common power source. The possibility of generating power from osmosis — when water molecules pass from a less salty solution to a more salty one — has long been known. However, actually generating energy from that has proved more complicated, in part due the difficulty of designing the membrane through which the molecules pass. Engineers in Fukuoka, Japan, and their private partners think they might have cracked it, and have opened what is only the world’s second osmotic power plant. It generates
Hundreds of Filipinos and tourists flocked to a sun-bleached field north of Manila yesterday, on Good Friday, to witness one of the country’s most blood-soaked displays of religious fervor, undeterred by rising fuel prices. Scores of bare-chested flagellants with covered faces walked barefoot through the dusty streets of Pampanga Province’s San Fernando as they flogged their backs with bamboo whips in the scorching heat. Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalists said they saw devotees deliberately puncturing their skin with glass shards attached to a small wooden paddle to ensure their bleeding during the ritual, a way to atone for sins and seek miracles from
Chinese dissident artist Gao Zhen (高兟), famous for making provocative satirical sculptures of former Chinese leader Mao Zedong (毛澤東), was tried on Monday over accusations of “defaming national heroes and martyrs,” his wife and a rights group said. Gao, 69, who was detained in 2024 during a visit from the US, faces a maximum three-year prison sentence, said his wife, Zhao Yaliang (趙雅良), and Shane Yi, a researcher at the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group which operates outside the nation. The closed-door, one-day trial took place at Sanhe City People’s Court in Hebei Province neighboring the capital, Beijing, and ended without a
RSS