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Russia has warned of tensions in North Korea slipping out of control, after Pyongyang announced it was placing its rockets on stand-by.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned the situation could slip “toward the spiral of a vicious circle”.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un made the missile order after talks responding to US stealth bomber flights over the Korean peninsula, state news agency KCNA said.
The time had come to “settle accounts” with the US, KCNA quoted him as saying.
Annual military drills and fresh UN sanctions have angered North Korea.
Russia has warned of tensions in North Korea slipping out of control, after Pyongyang announced it was placing its rockets on stand-by
After a late-night meeting with the army’s strategic rocket force, Kim Jong-un “judged the time has come to settle accounts with the US imperialists”, KCNA reported.
Kim Jong-un was said to have condemned US B-2 bomber sorties over South Korea as a “reckless phase” that represented an “ultimatum that they will ignite a nuclear war at any cost on the Korean Peninsula”.
US mainland and bases in Hawaii, Guam and South Korea were all named as potential targets.
The US – which flew two stealth bombers over the peninsula on Thursday as part of the ongoing annual US-South Korea military drills – has said it is ready for “any eventuality” on the peninsula.
Thousands of North Korean soldiers and students later took part in a mass rally in the centre of Pyongyang in support of Kim Jong-un’s announcement, beneath large portraits of his father Kim Jong-il and grandfather Kim Il-sung.
A South Korean defence ministry spokesman described the North Korean decision as a “continuing measure”, after its announcement to adopt “combat posture”.
China, North Korea’s biggest trading partner, immediately reiterated its call for all sides to ease tensions.
But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov went further, voicing concern that “we may simply let the situation slip out of our control and it will slide into a spiral of a vicious circle”.
While condemning Pyongyang’s actions as “unacceptable”, Sergei Lavrov gave a more general warning that “unilateral steps being taken around North Korea that manifest themselves in a build-up of military activity”.
Sergei Lavrov added what was needed was not a build-up of military muscle and a pretext for using military means to achieve “geopolitical objectives”, in remarks seen as an implicit criticism of US bomber flights.
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A car bomb exploded in the Syrian capital Damascus killing at least 31 people and sending smoke billowing across the capital’s skyline.
State media blamed the blast near the headquarters of the ruling Baath party on “terrorists”.
TV pictures showed images of dead people. Overseas activists said at least 31 people had been killed.
The violence comes as Russia and the Arab League say they want to broker direct government-opposition talks.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov described the war as “a road to nowhere”.
The opposition Syrian National Coalition is holding a two-day meeting in Egypt to discuss a framework for a possible solution.
Some 70,000 people have died since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in March 2011, the UN says.
Police and witnesses said the blast was a car bomb. It went off in the central Mazraa neighborhood, close to the Baath offices and Russian embassy.
Surrounding roads are reported to have been closed off to traffic and firefighters and medical staff were at the scene.
State and pro-regime TV showed pictures of dead bodies and destroyed cars.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 31 people had been killed in the explosion.
A car bomb exploded in the Syrian capital Damascus killing at least 31 people and sending smoke billowing across the capital’s skyline
Witnesses told AP news agency the car had exploded at a security checkpoint between the Russian embassy and the Baath Party central headquarters.
“It was huge. Everything in the shop turned upside down,” one local resident said. He said three of his employees were injured by flying glass that killed a young girl who was walking by when the blast hit.
“I pulled her inside the shop but she was almost gone. We couldn’t save her. She was hit in the stomach and head.”
Syrian state media said the explosion had struck near a school and clinic and that schoolchildren were among the casualties.
There have been two other explosions in the city, also at security checkpoints.
And heavy fighting between government and rebel forces is continuing around the city, with the government carrying out air strikes in the suburbs.
Sergei Lavrov said the Kremlin and the Arab League wanted to establish direct contact between the Syrian government and the opposition.
Speaking in Moscow, where he hosted league officials and several Arab foreign ministers, the Russian foreign minister said that sitting down at a negotiating table was the only way to end the conflict without irreparable damage to Syria.
“Neither side can allow itself to rely on a military solution to the conflict, because it is a road to nowhere, a road to mutual destruction of the people,” he said.
Sergei Lavrov and Arab League General Secretary Nabil Elaraby said their priority was to create a transitional government to navigate a way out of the violence.
No conditions for the negotiations have been set, they said.
The proposal initially received a cool reception from the Syrian National Coalition (SNC), with senior member Abdelbaset Sieda insisting Bashar al-Assad and his allies “must go first”.
“After that we can discuss with others in the regime who didn’t share in the killing of our people,” he said.
But the news agency Reuters says it has seen a draft SNC communiqué being discussed in Cairo which demonstrates an apparent softening in the group’s stance.
The document reasserts the group’s position that Bashar al-Assad’s apparatus cannot be part of any political solution in Syria, but omits previous demands that Assad’s regime must go even before any talks, Reuters says.
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Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad is to give a rare speech to the nation, state media say, as he continues to battle an uprising against his rule.
The address will cover “the latest developments in Syria and the region”, according to the Sana news agency.
It comes amid fierce fighting close to the capital, Damascus.
The UN estimates that more than 60,000 people have been killed in the uprising against President Assad, which began in March 2011.
The speech will be Bashar al-Assad’s first public address since June.
In an interview with Russian TV in November – his last public comments – he said he would “live and die in Syria”.
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad is to give a rare speech to the nation as he continues to battle an uprising against his rule
Since then opposition rebels have gained control of swathes of territory in northern Syria, and have formed a more inclusive leadership council which has been recognized by the US and the EU.
But opposition efforts to gain ground in and around major cities including Damascus have been met by stiff resistance and increasingly destructive air strikes.
On Saturday the activist Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported fierce fighting in Harasta and Daraya, suburbs of Damascus.
Diplomatic attempts to end the conflict in Syria have so far failed.
UN and Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi has been pushing a plan approved at an international conference in June that would create a transitional government.
But the plan leaves President Assad’s role unclear. The Syrian opposition has insisted that Bashar al-Assad must step down for the conflict to end.
Lakhdar Brahimi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said a week ago that a negotiated solution was the only option.
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Russia has warned against unilateral action in Syria after President Barack Obama said the US might intervene militarily if Damascus used chemical weapons on the rebels.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said there should be no outside interference and countries should “strictly adhere to the norms of international law”.
On Monday, President Barack Obama said the deployment of chemical weapons represented a “red line” for the US.
Meanwhile, troops are reported to have stormed a western suburb of Damascus.
On Tuesday, Russia’s foreign minister held talks in Moscow with China’s top diplomat, State Councilor Dai Bingguo, and a Syrian government delegation to discuss the conflict, which the UN says has left 18,000 people dead.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said there should be no outside interference and countries should "strictly adhere to the norms of international law"
After meeting Dai Bingguo, Sergei Lavrov said Moscow and Beijing based their diplomatic co-operation on “the need to strictly adhere to the norms of international law and the principles contained in the UN Charter, and not to allow their violation”.
“I think this is the only correct path in today’s conditions,” Sergei Lavrov added.
He said only the UN Security Council could authorize the use of force against Syria, and warned against imposing “democracy by bombs”.
He also told Syrian Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil that he wanted to hear his plans for “further actions to shift the situation into the channel of political dialogue in order for Syrians themselves to decide their fate without external interference”.
Qadri Jamil said external interference was “hindering efforts for Syrians themselves to resolve this problem”.
Russia and China have opposed intervention in Syria since anti-government protests erupted in March 2011. They have vetoed three Security Council resolutions seeking to press President Bashar al-Assad to end the violence.
On Monday, Barack Obama warned Syria’s government at a news conference that “there would be enormous consequences if we start seeing movement on the chemical weapons front or the use of chemical weapons”.
Barack Obama said that he had not ordered military engagement “at this point”, but added that the US was monitoring the situation carefully and had made contingency plans.
In July, the Syrian government admitted that it had chemical and biological weapons and might use them in case of any “external aggression”. But it insisted they would “never be used in the Syrian crisis, no matter what the internal developments”.
Correspondents say there is also growing unease in Washington that Syria’s chemical weapons may fall into what Barack Obama termed “the hands of the wrong people”.
On Tuesday, soldiers were said to have stormed the western Damascus suburb of Muadhamiya.
At least 23 people were killed and shops and houses were set on fire after government forces entered Muadhamiya at dawn, looking for rebel fighters, opposition activists said.
The bodies of several men who had been shot at close range were found inside buildings after the troops withdrew from the town, they added.
There was reportedly also heavy shelling and fierce fighting in the southern town of Herak and in the northern city of Aleppo, where the Japanese journalist, Mika Yamamoto, was killed on Monday.
A commander in the Free Syrian Army, Col Abdul Jabbar al-Ukaidi, told the AFP news agency that its fighters now controlled “more than 60%” of Aleppo, although a security source in Damascus dismissed the claims.
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