U.S. ends funding for Syria recovery effort

WASHINGTON — Making good on President Donald Trump’s stated desire to reduce the U.S. role in Syria, the State Department announced Friday it was eliminating $230 million in funding for “stabilization” projects in the war-ravaged country.

The slack will be made up by donations from other countries who have agreed to provide $300 million, State Department officials said. One-third of that money will come from Saudi Arabia.

“Working with Congress, the State Department will redirect these funds to support other key foreign policy priorities,” spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.

She said the decision “does not represent any lessening of U.S. commitment to our strategic goals in Syria.”

The Trump administration long ago shifted U.S. goals in Syria away from removing President Bashar Assad and ending the civil war to a more limited, concerted fight against the militant group Islamic State, which had taken over large parts of the country and neighboring Iraq.

Nauert briefed reporters in a conference call along with Brett McGurk, the U.S. special envoy for the coalition to defeat Islamic State, and David Satterfield, acting assistant secretary of state for the Middle East.

Trump previously cut off aid to some of the militias fighting Assad’s forces and ended stabilization projects in northwest Syria as he attempts to extricate the U.S. from the 7-year-old multisided conflict.

Pentagon officials have argued against beating too hasty a retreat. U.S. forces there, in addition to fighting Islamic State, are working to train and defend Kurdish forces against Turkey, protecting oil fields and keeping tabs on Russian and Iranian groups also in Syria.