Missiles to Turkey endorsed by NATO

A Syrian loads his belongings on a truck Tuesday as he prepares to flee fighting between Free Syrian Army fighters and government forces in Aleppo, Syria.
A Syrian loads his belongings on a truck Tuesday as he prepares to flee fighting between Free Syrian Army fighters and government forces in Aleppo, Syria.

— NATO foreign ministers Tuesday endorsed the decision to send Patriot missile batteries to Turkey, as concerns persisted about reports of heightened activity at Syria’s chemical weapons sites.

Meanwhile, Syrian forces continued to press an intense counteroffensive against rebels in the Damascus suburbs, the government blamed rebels for a mortar attack that hit a school, and the United Nations warned that the increasingly dangerous situation in the country was making it hard to provide enough food to displaced Syrians.

INTERACTIVE

Uprising in Syria

Turkey, a NATO member and a supporter of the Syrian opposition to Bashar Assad’s government, requested Patriot missile batteries last month, fearing that it might be vulnerable to a Syrian missile attack, possibly with chemical weapons.

“Turkey asked for NATO’s support, and we stand with Turkey in a spirit of strong solidarity,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the secretary general of the alliance, said in Brussels. “To anyone who would want to attack Turkey, we say, ‘Don’t even think about it.’”

NATO said the alliance would “augment” Turkey’s air defenses with the missiles, which are effective against missiles or aircraft. Officials stressed that the missile deployment was defensive in nature and not intended to establish a buffer zone in northern Syria or a no-fly zone over the country.

The missile batteries, drawn from U.S., German and Dutch forces, will not be operational in Turkey for several weeks yet, diplomats said. Each of the three nations will decide individually how many batteries to deploy in Turkey and for how long.

NATO couched the decision as a statement of its resolve. Though he described the fighting in Syria, which has killed more than 40,000 people, as “outrageous,” Rasmussen said NATO’s responsibility was to protect the population and territory of its members, and he stressed that the alliance had no intention of intervening in Syria to stop the violence.

“We have no intention to intervene militarily,” he said.

Alliance members received reports from the United States and other countries Tuesday concerning activity at Syria’s chemical weapons sites, which was said to be increasing. Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius of France said the information had not been confirmed, but Rasmussen said the report nonetheless prompted “grave concerns.”

“Any such action would be completely unacceptable and a clear breach of international law,” Rasmussen said.

The Patriot batteries in Turkey will be linked to NATO’s air defense system and will be under the alliance’s command and control. If a Syrian missile were to be fired at Turkey, longer-range radar systems would identify the missile’s trajectory and cue the Patriot batteries to take countermeasures.

The response by the missile batteries would be nearly automatic, firing interceptor missiles to destroy the target by ramming into it, a tactic the military calls “hit to kill.” At least some of the Patriot batteries will be PAC-3 versions, the most modern.

When used for anti-missile defense, the Patriot batteries have a range of 16 miles; they will be placed too far from the border to fire into Syrian airspace. The missiles’ warheads and any debris from collisions would fall on Turkish territory.

Russia has complained about the Turkish request for the missiles, apparently fearing that it might be a prelude to direct NATO involvement in the conflict, which the alliance has so far avoided. As it became clear that the alliance planned to proceed anyway, Russian officials tempered their criticism.

Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, was at NATO headquarters Tuesday to represent his country in the NATO-Russia Council. He asserted that Moscow had no objection to steps by the alliance to defend its members, though he still suggested that the Patriot deployments were not needed.

“We are not trying to interfere,” Lavrov said at a news conference. “We are just attracting the attention to the fact that threats should not be overstated.”

Lavrov also played down reports of increased activity at Syria’s chemical weapons sites, saying that his government has previously asked the Assad government about “rumors” that chemical weapons were being moved and was told they were baseless.

U.S. and Western officials took the reports more seriously. On Monday, Rasmussen said, “Syrian stockpiles of chemical weapons are a matter of great concern.”

The Netherlands has sent Patriot batteries to Turkey twice before — in 1991, as a defense against Iraq’s Scud missiles before the Persian Gulf War, and in 2003 before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

SHELL HITS CLASSROOM

Syria’s state news agency SANA said nine students and one teacher were killed when a mortar shell fired by “terrorists” — how the regime refers to rebels — hit a ninth-grade classroom in the Al-Wafideen area. The housing project, about 15 miles northeast of central Damascus, houses 25,000 people displaced from the Golan Heights since the 1967 war between Syria and Israel.

SANA said earlier that 29 students and one teacher had been killed before reporting the lower number.

The opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 10 were killed and did not specify who fired the mortar.

The Local Coordinating Committees, a network of rebel groups, reported the mortar attack without comment, implying that it was carried out by the government. But an activist reached in Damascus said it was unclear who had fired the shell. Recent bombs and mortar attacks by rebels that have killed civilians have angered supporters and opponents of the government in recent weeks, as even some who support the rebels express concern that the violence has spiraled out of control.

FIGHTING RAGES

More evidence emerged Tuesday that the situation in the country was deteriorating, a day after the United Nations and the European Union announced that they were curtailing activities and pulling staff members out of Damascus, the capital. Fighting raged in an arc around Damascus on Monday, from the southwest to the northeast, and most commercial flights continued to stay away from the Damascus Airport.

The United Nations’ World Food Program, which is feeding 1.5 million people in Syria, 85 percent of them displaced by the fighting, issued a report warning that food shortages were intensifying because of rising bread prices and indiscriminate attacks on U.N. vehicles that made food distribution difficult.

The roads are so dangerous, the agency said, that it is trying to obtain more armored vehicles to allow its provincial offices to continue to monitor food distribution.

The agency, along with other U.N. organizations, has suspended its operations outside Damascus and sent home nonessential foreign staff members, further hampering its work, it said. Most food distribution is done by local partners, mainly the Syrian Arab Red Cross. Still, the World Food Program maintains 20 foreign and 100 local employees in Syria.

“I can absolutely confirm to you that we will continue our work,” Muhannad Hadi, the country director, said in an interview from Jordan, where he traveled on business with plans to return to Syria.

Rebels and government forces continued to clash around a strategic air base at Wadi al-Deif, near Maarat al-Noaman, a crossroads town on the road between Damascus and Aleppo, as government airstrikes around Damascus continued for a fourth day with no sign of abating and neither side apparently able to win.

Even as the government was bringing overwhelming force to bear, it was still unable to quell the rebels, who have managed to disrupt the airport and force a counteroffensive to seal off the city center from the restive suburbs. Yet although rebels have managed to put pressure on the government around Damascus in recent weeks, several fighters interviewed said the fighting had become exhausting and there was no coordinated strategy.

Information for this article was contributed by Anne Barnard, Hania Mourtada and Christine Hauser of The New York Times; and by Ben Hubbard, Albert Aji, Barbara Surk, Ian Deitch, Slobodan Lekic, Kimberly Dozier and Pauline Jelinek of The Associated Press.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/05/2012

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