Monday, May 6, 2013

'Do you really risk going to war ...over this?'

"... In the 10 days since the Obama administration notified Congress that it suspected, with “varying degrees of confidence,” that chemical weapons had been employed in Syria, no concrete proof has emerged, and some headline-grabbing claims have been discredited or contested. Officials worldwide now admit that no allegations rise to the level of certainty.Yet political rhetoric on Syria has overtaken actual evidence in a high-stakes Washington debate that’s increasing pressure on Obama to lend more military support to the rebels fighting to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad.... 
-- British officials now say they're uncertain how the few samples they’ve analyzed were gathered, handled and preserved...
-- Turkish doctors over the weekend also cast doubt on another reported chemical attack, this one in the Syrian city of Saraqib, where rebels claimed some sort of chemical weapon had been dropped ...
-- Adding to the confusion over the weekend was Carla del Ponte, a member of the United Nations’ Independent International Commission of Inquiry for Syria and a former war crimes prosecutor. Del Ponte told Swiss television on Sunday that “according to the testimonies we have gathered, the rebels have used chemical weapons, making use of sarin gas.”... "

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/05/06/190516/despite-political-clamor-over.html#storylink=cp"

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