US military deployment in Syria illegal, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov -

Geneva: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has criticised, ‘The arrogance of the United States has been exposed with the announcement to deploy military in Syria, for the security of the oil assets, without taking permission from the Assad government. This is a blatant violation of Syrian sovereignty by the United States.’ Lavrov asked a sarcastic question ‘Which location is the United States exactly trying to protect with this deployment?’

The United States announced massive military deployment in the Deir Al-Zor region, to the east of the Euphrates river, which is under the Kurdish control. The locals claimed that the US soldiers, armoured vehicles and tanks have reached the Deir Al-Zor region. US Secretary for Defence, Mark Esper, announced that this deployment was to ensure that the oil reserves in the region do not fall in the hands of IS and other terrorists.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Iranian Foreign Minister Jawad Zarif and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu attacked this US military deployment in strong words during a tripartite meeting held in Geneva. Lavrov accused the United States of violating Syrian sovereignty by deploying the military in that country without the permission of the Assad government. At the same time, the Russian Foreign Minister claimed that the United States is deviating from the statements made during a meeting at Geneva, in the month of March.

In March, the United States had announced that its military had defeated IS, having bases in Syria, completely. Big IS commanders had been killed in the US action and hundreds of IS terrorists were detained in Syria. US President Donald Trump had stated that there were people from European countries among the terrorists and had appealed to the European countries to repatriate them.

But the European countries had not responded to the appeal made by Trump. Turkey initiated attacks on the Kurdish locations in Syria at the beginning of this month. At least 800 IS terrorists escaped along with their families from the Kurdish custody because of the Turkish attacks.

The US defence department is claiming that this escape of the IS terrorists has, once again, brought the issue of security of the oil reserves in Syria, on the anvil.

Against this background, the United States announced military deployment for the security of the oil sector under Kurdish control. The US President had clarified that this deployment was necessary to ensure that the Syrian oil reserves do not fall in the hands of these IS terrorists. But the redeployment of the military in just a few days after the withdrawal from Syria under the pretext of security of the Syrian oil sector is being questioned even in the United States.