The United States has suspended operations of our Embassy in Damascus as of February 6. Ambassador Ford and all American personnel have now departed the country.
The recent surge in violence, including bombings in Damascus on December 23 and January 6, has raised serious concerns that our Embassy is not sufficiently protected from armed attack. We, along with several other diplomatic missions, conveyed our security concerns to the Syrian Government but the regime failed to respond adequately.
Ambassador Ford has left Damascus but he remains the United States Ambassador to Syria and its people. As the President’s representative, he will continue his work and engagement with the Syrian people as head of our Syria team in Washington. Together with other senior U.S. officials, Ambassador Ford will maintain contacts with the Syrian opposition and continue our efforts to support the peaceful political transition which the Syrian people have so bravely sought.
U.S. ambassador to Syria pelted with tomatoes, stones in protest: You might remember the assault against U.S. Ambassador Robert Ford, who’s been critical of Assad’s regime, from about a month ago. That one didn’t involve stones and tomatoes. This one did. source
Note: The clip above is not in English. One thing the highly-produced clip does show„ though, around the two minute mark, is the assault of Robert Ford, the Damascus-based U.S. ambassador to Syria, who was ambushed by pro-Assad demonstrators. One of the protesters tried to wrap him up in a posters that features the Syrian leader’s face. So the real question, of course, is, how did he allow himself to get into such a situation? Just in case you’re wondering since you don’t understand Arabic — the clip they show is something of the Syrian equivalent of a Nancy Grace report, and is totally stilted and biased. “[The clip is] a weak, banal, laughable attempt by the Syrian thugs to have the international community focus on anything but the real story,” a State Department official said, “which is the government’s continuing campaign of terror on its own people through torture, murder and illegal imprisonment.” source
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