The White House announced on Thursday that U.S. President Barack Obama does not intend to recall the American ambassador to Damascus, Robert Ford, after his first call on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down.
National Security Council Spokesman Tommy Vietor told the France Presse news agency, “We need (the ambassador) to remain there.”
Vietor’s statements came after Obama demanded that al-Assad step down and enforced sanctions on the Syrian regime to “deepen the financial isolation of the Assad regime,” although he ruled out any American intervention.
Washington made it clear that al-Assad had lost his legitimacy to rule the country and said that Syria will be a better place without him, although it didn’t openly demand that he step down.
Some activists and a number of American officials criticized Obama for calling upon Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to step down (although he didn’t), while not calling on al-Assad to do the same until now.
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