The White House may not insist upon including the threat of force in a possible U.N. resoultion on Syria aimed at making Bashar al-Assad turn over his chemical weapons to the international community, but it could seek other deterrants such as sanctions, NBC reported Friday.
“The administration won’t get specific, but they indicated that a use of force component might be off the table,” NBC’s Kirsten Welker reported on MSNBC. “One senior administration official essentially acknowledging that Russia would never agree to a use of force component. They wouldn’t get specific, saying they’re not going to start negotiating from here. However, they didn’t rule out the possibility of sanctions or possibly calling everyone back to the U.N.”
While White House press secretary Jay Carney declined to give an estimate on how long the process may take Thursday, Welker shed more light on the administration’s timeline.
“I can tell you that for the first time, these administration officials are giving us a timeline,” she said. “They want to see a U.N. Security Council resolution within several weeks, they say. That is their first benchmark for the progress that they are looking for in these talks. They say they want to see real progress on Assad actually beginning to turn over his chemical weapons within several months.”
Secretary of State John Kerry is currently engaged in diplomatic negotiations with Russia’s foreign minister on the proposed deal.
“Should diplomacy fail, force might be necessary,” Kerry said Thursday at a joint press conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Geneva, Switzerland.
In his prime time speech to the nation last week, President Barack Obama underscored the fact that U.S. military action against Syria remained on the table, however. He also argued that only the threat of force has led to the possibility of an effective diplomatic response.
