AFP, Washington, Feb 25, 2010  – The United States said it saw no sign Thursday that Syria, which welcomed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad in Damascus, was heeding US concerns about the Syrian-Iranian alliance.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday that Washington is urging Syria to ’begin to move away from the relationship with Iran’ now that a US ambassador is returning to Damascus for the first time in five years.
’As the secretary reiterated yesterday, we have expressed our concern directly to President (Bashar) Assad about Syria’s relationship with Iran,’ Clinton’s spokesman Philip Crowley said.
’This is ultimately a decision that Syria has to make, but as President Assad assesses Syria’s long-term interests, he need only look around the region and recognize that Syria is increasingly an outlier,’ Crowley told reporters.
’We want to see Syria play a more constructive role in the region,’ he added.
’One step would be to make clear what Iran’s need to do differently and unfortunately there was no evidence of that today,’ he said.
The United States accuses Syria and Iran of supporting militant groups in the region, including the Lebanese political and guerrilla movement Hezbollah as well as the Palestinian radical group Hamas.
Iran and Syria are the main foreign backers of the Shiite militant group Hezbollah but both deny that they provide anything other than moral support.
Washington also accuses Syria of turning a blind eye to militants crossing its border into Iraq.
In Damascus, Assad and Ahamdinejad signed a visa-scrapping accord on Thursday, signaling even closer ties and brushing aside US efforts to drive a wedge between the two allies.
Ahamdinejad, who flew in to Damascus earlier in the day and later met exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, stressed that ties between the two Muslim states, both outspoken critics of US ally Israel, were as ’solid’ as ever.