‘Don’t contract out morality on Syria to UN’ urges Cameron

The world must not “contract out” its morality to the United Nations Security Council by giving permanent members such as Russia the final say on whether military action should be taken against Syria to punish Bashar Assad for using chemical weapons against his own people, David Cameron warned yesterday.

Mr Cameron was speaking at the end of an acrimonious summit of the G20 in St Petersburg which exposed stark divisions between host Vladimir Putin and US president Barack Obama, who is seeking Congressional support for punitive strikes.

The Russian president – a close ally of Assad – declared that any attack without a UN resolution would “violate the law”.

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He indicated that he was ready to give further military assistance to the Damascus regime if it comes under attack from the US and France, saying: “Will we help Syria? We will. And we are already helping – we send arms, we co-operate in the economic sphere.”

Amid heightened tensions about the possible use of force, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported the country’s navy HQ as saying that a fourth Russian naval vessel is on its way to Syria to join three already in the eastern Mediterranean.

Mr Obama was left relatively isolated at the G20, as only France indicated it was ready to join the US in taking military action, while Britain, Turkey, Canada and Saudi Arabia voiced support for robust action to respond to the poison gas attack on a Damascus suburb which claimed hundreds of lives on August 21.

The US president insisted he was “encouraged by my discussions with world leaders this week” and said there was “a growing recognition that we cannot sit idly by”.