The Syrian president Bashar al-Assad last night warned that the Middle East could “explode” if the United States and France pressed ahead with threatened air strikes on Syria, reports The Independent.
In an interview with the French newspaper, Le Figaro, Mr Assad said: “The Middle East is barrel of powder and today the flames are creeping closer. It is not just a question of the Syrian response but what else might happen after the first (Western) air strike… Everyone will lose control of the situation when the powder barrel explodes”.
“Chaos and extremism will proliferate. The rise of a region-wide war is real.”
The comments come as Russia’s defence ministry informed President Vladimir Putin that two “ballistic objects” had been detected by its early warning radar system, according to news agencies in the country.
The missiles were reportedly fired from a point in the centre of the Mediterranean at 10.16am Moscow time (7.16am BST) this morning, “towards the eastern part of the coast”. While the Russian state RIA news agency quoted sources in Damascus as saying the missiles later fell into the sea, it will come as a warning to the Syrian government.
Speaking to Le Figaro’s veteran Middle East correspondent, Georges Malbrunot, Mr Assad denied that his regime was responsible for the poison gas attack on an opposition-held Damascus suburb on 21 August.
“Whoever accuses us must offer proof,” he said. “Neither Mr Obama nor Mr Hollande is capable of doing so, even to their own peoples.”
Mr Assad refused to confirm or deny that his forces had chemical stockpiles. If his regime did have such weapons, he said, it would have been “illogical” to use them in an area “where our forces are also present”.
Asked if he regarded France as the enemy of Syria, because President Francois Hollande had agreed to join the US in punitive air strikes, Mr Assad said: “The French people are not our enemy but… in so far as the French state is hostile to the Syrian people, this state is our enemy.”
The French government last night declassified and published a nine-page intelligence report which said there was clear evidence that the Assad regime carried out the gas attack last month. The report had earlier been shown by Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault to opposition leaders and chairmen of key parliamentary committees before a debate in the National Assembly.
Read more of this report from The Independent.