Press Release FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 6, 2017 Washington, DC - The Coalition for a Democratic Syria (CDS) -- a multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian coalition of six Syrian American advocacy organizations representing the Syrian American community including Syrian Christians for Peace, Syrian Emergency Task Force, Syrian American Council, United for a Free Syria, American Syriac Union, and the Association of a Free Syrians -- welcomes President Trump's consideration of military retaliation against the Assad regime for its massacre of civilians with chemical weapons.
CDS calls on the Trump Administration not to repeat President Obama’s in August 2013, and to act immediately to strike the Assad regime as punishment for its attacks on Syrian civilians. “The U.S. must ground the entire Syrian Air Force, which has ruthlessly bombarded civilians with chemical weapons and explosive barrels for years with impunity,” said Mouaz Moustafa, Executive Director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force and Policy Advisor for CDS. “Seeing the devastation of families who lost small children to the Regime’s chemical weapons compels the United States to finally take leadership.
We must consider striking military runways used to launch these heinous attacks against civilians.” United Nations Security Council Resolutions 2118, passed in 2014, has made clear that the use of chemical weapons in Syria is punishable under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which includes the authorization of military consequences. The UN's Joint Investigative Mechanism has also confirmed a number of chemical weapons attacks in Syria in the past four years since the infamous August 2013 chemical weapons attack in Ghouta in the Damascus suburbs.
Failing to punish Assad will grant his Regime a green light to continue the merciless attacks against women and children. President Obama's failure to strike Assad in 2013 led to the refugee crisis, the continued use of chemical weapons, and the rise of ISIS. President Trump cannot afford to make the same mistake.
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