China warns against military action in Syria as threat of US strikes put everyone on high alert
Trump cancels his South America trip to focus on military response, while Iranian official says Israel will pay for an alleged attack on airbase
Beijing has called for calm in Syria where government forces and their allies are on alert amid fears of a US strike after an apparent chemical weapons attack, war monitors said.
Saturday’s suspected poison gas attack in the rebel-held town of Douma, just east of Damascus, and then Monday’s air strike by US ally Israel on a base where Iranians were stationed have escalated tensions in the already volatile Middle East.
Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said seven Iranians were killed in the attack. There has been no comment from Israel on the strike on the T4 airbase in Syria’s central Homs province.
President Donald Trump, meanwhile, cancelled his first official trip to Latin America this week to focus on responding to a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria, the White House announced.
Trump had been scheduled to travel to Lima, Peru, on Friday to attend the Summit of the Americas and then travel on to Bogota, Colombia.