Trump: Syrian Militant Aid Program Was «Dangerous, Wasteful»

Local Editor

US President Donald Trump on Monday announced he had ended a program to support armed groups fighting against the Syrian Army because it was "massive, dangerous, and wasteful."

The comments came days after General Tony Thomas, the head of US special operations confirmed that the four-year-old operation was brought to a close but denied the decision was motivated by a desire to placate Russia.

"The Amazon Washington Post fabricated the facts on my ending massive, dangerous, and wasteful payments to Syrian ‘rebels' fighting Assad....." Trump tweeted.

The missive appeared to be a response to an article by the newspaper published hours earlier and titled "Cooperation with Russia becomes central to Trump strategy in Syria."

It quoted anonymous officials as saying "the United States and its proxies would concede Assad's control of most of central and southern Syria" in return for Moscow and its allies steering clear of US coalition operations against the Wahhabi Daesh [Arabic acronym for "ISIS" / "ISIL"].

The US and Russia agreed on creating de-escalation zones in southern Syria at their first meeting at the G20 in Hamburg earlier this month.

Former president Barack Obama approved the armed group aid program in 2013 as various insurgent groups sought external support in a foreign-backed uprising in Syria.

Thousands of Syrian armed group fighters were trained and armed.

But the US commitment remained ambiguous amid doubts in some quarters that the armed groups could actually manage to depose the current Syrian government and as attention turned to the rising power of Daesh in Syria and Iraq.

Support for the program further eroded last year after the militants lost the areas they held in the Syrian city of Aleppo under a brutal Russian-backed government assault.

US officials said last week that some of armed forces could be absorbed into US military-supported groups fighting Daesh.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team