U.S. starts withdrawing forces from Syria

<p style="text-align:left">The United States said on Wednesday, December 19, that it has started withdrawing its forces from Syria as US officials said White house was considering pulling out all its troops as it winds up its campaign to retake territory once held by Islamic State.

&ldquo;We have started returning United States troops home as we transition to the next phase of this campaign,&rdquo; White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement issued after President Donald Trump tweeted that &ldquo;We have defeated ISIS in Syria, my only reason for being there.&rdquo;

It was not immediately clear from Sanders&rsquo; statement whether all of the roughly 2,000 US troops in the country would leave and if so, by when.

Sanders suggested that the United States would remain engaged to some degree, Reuters reported.

&ldquo;The United States and our allies stand ready to re-engage at all levels to defend American interests whenever necessary, and we will continue to work together to deny radical Islamist terrorists territory, funding, support,&rdquo; she said.

A decision to pull out completely, if confirmed, would upend assumptions about a longer-term US military presence in Syria, which senior US officials have advocated to help ensure Islamic State cannot reemerge.

It could also undercut US leverage in the region and undermine diplomatic efforts to end a civil war in Syria that has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced around half of the country&rsquo;s pre-war 22 million population.

The US State Department is evacuating all of its personnel from Syria within 24 hours, a US official told Reuters.

Reports of a full US military withdrawal drew immediate criticism, including from some of Trump&rsquo;s fellow Republicans.

Trump has previously expressed a strong desire to bring troops home from Syria when possible, and his tweet on Wednesday showed he saw no further grounds for remaining.

US officials, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, did not disclose details about the deliberations on the troop withdrawal, and the timing was not immediately clear.

But one official told Reuters that partners and allies had been consulted. Two US officials said a decision to withdraw had already been reached but that could not be immediately confirmed.

The Pentagon declined to comment, saying only that it continued to work with partners in the region.

Many of the remaining US troops in Syria are working closely with an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

A complete withdrawal of US troops from Syria would still leave a sizeable US military presence in the region, including about 5,200 troops across the border in Iraq. Much of the US campaign in Syria has been waged by warplanes flying out of Qatar and other locations in the Middle East.

Reporter&rsquo;s code: 50101

News Code 35484

Your Comment

You are replying to: .
captcha