Syria strikes - as it happened: Bashar al-Assad's chemical weapons capability 'set back for years' by bombing, Pentagon says
Theresa May warns of further strikes if regime uses poison again
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Joint air strikes by the US, UK and France have set back Syria’s chemical weapons capability “for years”, the US military said.
Cruise missiles were fired at three sites in response to what Theresa May called the “despicable and barbaric” attack in Douma last week that is believed to have killed up to 75 people.
Ms May said Bashar al-Assad could face even further strikes if chemical weapons are used again - and the US warned that they were "locked and loaded" if poison used again.
US President Donald Trump declared “mission accomplished” after more than 100 missiles were collectively launched in the early hours of the morning.
During telephone conversations on Saturday afternoon, Ms May, Mr Trump and Emmanuel Macron all agreed that the military strikes in Syria "had been a success".
Downing Street published a document setting out why it believes military action against the Syrian regime was legal after Jeremy Corbyn described the action as legally questionable.
The Russian embassy in the US said it had warned that such actions would "not be left without consequences", adding that insulting President Vladimir Putin was "unacceptable and inadmissible".
Please allow a moment for the live blog to load
Russia and Syria claimed most of the missiles, numbering about 110, were intercepted, while the Pentagon said Syrian defences had “no effect” on the operation.
Mr Assad, backed also by Iran, said on Saturday the bombings would increase his country’s resolve to “fight and crush terrorism”.
Ms May said she had authorised British forces to conduct precision strikes against Syria to help degrade its chemical weapons capability.
“This is not about intervening in a civil war. It is not about regime change,” Ms May said in a statement. “It is about a limited and targeted strike that does not further escalate tensions in the region and that does everything possible to prevent civilian casualties.”
RAF Tornado jets bombed a chemical weapons facility 15 miles outside Homs, the Ministry of Defence said.
Russia warned of “consequences” for the US-led military strikes, saying the use of missiles on suspected chemical weapons assets were an insult to Vladimir Putin.
“A pre-designed scenario is being implemented,” Russian ambassador Anatoly Antonov said in a statement. “Again, we are being threatened. We warned that such actions will not be left without consequences.”
Earlier, Russia’s military claimed to have evidence that Britain had “direct involvement” in staging the suspected chemical attack in Syria, a charge quickly condemned as “grotesque” by the UK.
Humanitarian volunteers were “seriously pressured” by the UK to speed up plans for a “provocation” in eastern Ghouta, Moscow’s defence ministry suggested.
Britain’s ambassador to the UN condemned the “blatant lie” as “the worst piece of fake news we’ve yet seen from the Russian propaganda machine”.
Later, a spokesman for the UK Foreign Office said: “These accusations from Moscow are just the latest in a number of ludicrous allegations from Russia, who have also said that no attack ever happened.
“This simply shows their desperation to pin the blame on anyone but their client: the [President Bashar] Assad regime
It comes as Russia and the United States traded fresh blows during the latest round of talks at the UN Security Council and amid warnings that the world is at risk of “full-blown military escalation”.
The State Department said the United States has proof at “a very high level of confidence” that the Syrian government of Mr Assad carried out the attack but is still working to identify the mix of chemicals used.
“Syria is responsible. We are all in agreement,” department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told reporters.
Additional reporting by agencies
Over at the White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said something siimilar during her briefing. Ms Sanders said that the US was very confident that Syria carried out the apparent chemical attack and that US intelligence shows Russia's claim that the attack was faked was false.
“Our intelligence tells us otherwise. I can't go beyond that,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters, when asked about Russia's claim.
“We have a very high confidence that Syria was responsible,” she adding, saying Russia's failure to stop Syria has been “part of the problem.”
Turkey's president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said he has urged calm and efforts to restitute peace in Syria during separate calls this week with Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
Mr Erdogan also said tensions between the two countries over a suspected chemical attack in the Damascus suburb of Douma now seem to have eased.
He said: "What we insisted on tenaciously was the fact that is not right for tensions to heat up; we made requests concerning the restitution of peace and the end of the tragedy that is going on."
The Turkish leader also said he sent video recordings concerning the "painful and disastrous scenes" in eastern Ghouta and Douma to Mr Putin through an envoy of the Russian leader. He did not elaborate.
Three Democrats in the US Senate, led by Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, have sent a letter to President Trump urging him to make a public and compelling legal case for any attack.
"This issue is of critical importance and the American people should be fully informed about your rationale for deploying American military power and the objectives of any US military action in Syria," Mr Reed wrote, joined by Senators Dick Durbin of Illinois and Bob Menendez of New Jersey.
"As previous commanders in chief have done in similar situations, we believe you should present a clear public articulation of these matters to the American people at the earliest appropriate time," the letter reads.
President Donald Trump is pressing for a more aggressive US strike against Syria than military chiefs have recommended as he adopts a tougher stance against Russian President Vladimir Putin, US officials have told Reuters
One senior official said Trump has asked his military to consider options that would include punishing Russia and Iran — Syria's main foreign backers — in part over his growing level of exasperation with Mr Putin.
However, said two other officials, Defence Secretary James Mattis and other military leaders have warned that the larger the attack, the greater the risk of a confrontation with Russia.
With that, we are ending our live coverage for now. Thanks for reading.
Lieutenant General Kenneth McKenzie gave more details about the strikes.
Fifty-seven Tomahawk cruise missiles were launched against the Barzah research and development facility, while a further 22 projectiles were fired at the second and third targets at Him Shinsar.
Syria's chemical weapons programme had been set back several years as a result of the strikes, he claimed.
The US has no record of civilian casualties yet, Lt Gen McKenzie said.
Hi, we are opening our live blog after US President Donald Trump announced he had ordered "precision strikes" on Syria in partnership with France and the UK
There is a Pentagon briefing going on, and also the UK Ministry of Defence says 'initial indications' show 'successful attack' on Syrian military facility.
The US says that multiple targets have been hit, making it larger than the single target hit in April 2017 in the wake of another chemical attack, using sarin, believed to be by the Syrian government.
That response a year ago was one of Mr Trump's first major foreign policy moves.
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