US: No Syria reconstruction aid if Iran stays

WASHINGTON: The United States said it will refuse any post-war reconstruction assistance to Syria if Iran is present, expanding the rationale for US involvement in the conflict.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, speaking to a pro-Israel group, vowed an aggressive push to counter Iran across the Middle East and said that Syria was a decisive battleground.

“The onus for expelling Iran from the country falls on the Syrian government, which bears responsibility for its presence there,” Pompeo told the Jewish Institute for National Security of America.

“If Syria doesn’t ensure the total withdrawal of Iranian-backed troops, it will not receive one single dollar from the United States for reconstruction,” Pompeo said.

Pompeo’s speech effectively broadens the official explanation for why the United States is involved in Syria’s civil war, which a monitoring group says has killed close to 365,000 people since 2011.

Former president Barack Obama authorised military action with the goal of rooting out the Islamic State group, or ISIS.

The United States has about 2,000 troops in Syria, primarily to train and advise forces other than ISIS that are waging an increasingly precarious fight to topple President Bashar al-Assad.

Pompeo acknowledged that Assad was stronger thanks to Iranian and Russian help and said, with ISIS “beaten into a shadow of its former self,” new priorities had emerged.