Syria raps US-led coalition forces, oil losses in UN speech

WHIA/AP

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Syria’s top diplomat demanded Monday that a U.S.-led military coalition to get out of his country and told the U.N. General Assembly meeting of world leaders that Damascus wants compensation for losses suffered by its oil and gas industry during a civil war that has been going on for 11 years.

Hundreds of U.S. troops are stationed in eastern Syria to help the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces fight the Islamic State militant group. Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad said the coalition’s presence contradicts international law and “should end immediately, without conditions.”

“Fighting terrorism does not happen through an illegitimate international coalition that violates Syria’s sovereignty and destroys towns and villages,” he said on the closing day of the U.N. General Assembly, arguing that battling terrorism can’t work without “coordination” with Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government.

The civil war began in 2011 with anti-government protests demanding democratic reforms but quickly escalated into fighting. Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed, large parts of the country have been destroyed and half the country’s prewar population has been displaced.

Amid the chaos, the Islamic State group took over significant parts of Syria. Though the group 2019 lost the last sliver of land its fighters controlled, its sleeper cells are still active