'Insulting': Russia furious over Syria attacks, as politician likens Trump to Hitler

Russia’s ambassador to the United States warns that the strikes by US, France and the UK will have consequences

The Guardian

Russia has warned there will be “consequences” for the US-led airstrikes on Syria, with a high-ranking Russian politician comparing Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler.In a strongly worded statement, Russia’s ambassador to the United States described the air strikes, carried out jointly by the US, France and the UK, as a direct threat to Moscow and said insulting President Vladimir Putin was “unacceptable and inadmissible”.

“We are being threatened,” said ambassador Anatoly Antonov. “We warned that such actions will not be left without consequences.”

Antonov accused the US of hypocrisy, saying it had “no moral right to blame other countries” when it was in possession of the biggest arsenal of chemical weapons in the world.

Alexander Sherin, Russia’s deputy head of the state Duma’s defence committee, likened Trump to Hitler and described the air strikes as a targeted threat against Russia. Russia has had a military presence in Syria since 2015 to support Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.

In comments reported by state news agency RIA Novosti, Sherin said Trump “can be called Adolf Hitler No. 2 of our time because, you see, he even chose the time that Hitler attacked the Soviet Union”, making reference to the Nazi forces’ first attacks against the USSR in 1941, which were also launched at about 4am.

In its first reaction to the strikes Russia’s foreign ministry claimed Syria had been attacked just as it had “a chance for peace”.

“First the ‘Arab spring’ tested the Syrian people, then Islamic State, now smart American rockets. The capital of a sovereign government, trying for years to survive under terrorist aggression, has been attacked,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova wrote on Facebook.

“You have to be quite abnormal to attack Syria’s capital just at the moment when it had a chance for a peaceful future,” she wrote.

The comments came after Russia accused the UK of “staging” the chemical weapons attacks in Douma, the last rebel-held enclave of eastern Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus. At least 70 people are reported to have died and more than 500 injured there.

Russia’s defence ministry claimed the whole attack was faked and said it had “irrefutable evidence” the UK was instrumental in staging it as a way to justify Western intervention in Syria.

“We have evidence that proves Britain was directly involved in organising this provocation,” defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said. Britain’s UN envoy, Karen Pierce, hit back, describing the Russian accusation as a “grotesque, blatant lie.”

The US, Britain and France made the case for military action against Syria at a UN security council meeting on Friday. However, Russia’s UN ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said the three countries had ulterior motives and just wanted to “oust the Syrian government and to deter, contain the Russian Federation.”