French President Emmanuel Macron confessed in an interview that joint strikes conducted by France, Britain and the United States targeted Turkey’s relations with Russia.
“With those strikes we have separated the Russians and the Turks on this. The Turks condemned the chemical weapons,” Macron said in an interview broadcasted by BFM TV, RMC radio and Mediapart online news.
France, Britain and the U.S. launched over 100 missiles early on Saturday targeting what they said were three chemical weapons facilities in Syria in response to a suspected poison gas attack in Eastern Ghouta’s Douma on April 7 that killed at least 78 people.
Macron said that the strikes were “perfectly carried out,” adding “All of our missiles reached their target.”
The French president stated that Russia, which is one of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s staunchest allies, was complicit in the Syrian government's actions.
"Of course they [Russia] are complicit. They have not used chlorine themselves, but they have methodically built the international community's inability to act through diplomatic channels to stop the use of chemical weapons," Macron said of Moscow.
He added that he had convinced U.S. President Donald Trump to keep troops in Syria for the long term.
“Ten days ago, President Trump was saying ‘the United States should withdraw from Syria’. We convinced him it was necessary to stay. We convinced him it was necessary to stay for the long term,” Macron said.
Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011 when the Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.
