West mounts pressure on Russia over Syria

Pressure to drop its resistance to tougher U.N. action on Syria mounted on Russia, as Russian President Vladimir Putin met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and was scheduled to meet French President François Hollande on June 1, to reiterate Moscow’s stance, Hurriyet Daily News reports.

Putin said Syria could be on the brink of a civil war, but added that he was opposed to military intervention to stop the bloodshed. “You cannot do anything by force,” he told reporters in Berlin, after he and Merkel held talks in which they sought a “political solution” to the crisis.

“Today we are seeing emerging elements of civil war,” Agence France-Presse quoted him as saying. “It is extremely dangerous.” But he hit back at suggestions that Moscow was supplying arms for use in Syria, saying his country did not deliver weapons to be deployed in civil conflicts. “As far as arms supplies are concerned, Russia does not supply the weapons that could be used in a civil conflict,” he said. The Russian president was also scheduled to meet with Hollande, and the Syrian crisis was expected to dominate their agenda.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, speaking in Denmark, said Russia’s policy of resisting U.N.

Security Council action against Damascus was only increasing the chance of civil war erupting. The Russians “are telling me they don’t want to see a civil war. I have been telling them their policy is going [to] help to contribute to a civil war,” Clinton said.