US President Barack Obama
will give interviews on Monday to the three network news anchors, as well as
PBS, CNN and Fox News, more evidence of a "full-court press" strategy
before pivotal congressional votes on military strikes in Syria.
The interviews will air during each network's
Monday evening news broadcast, the White House said.
President Obama urged
Americans on Saturday to back him in launching an attack on Syria, as
diplomatic pressure grew on the United States to wait for a UN report expected
in a week's time before beginning military action.
Fresh from a European trip in which he failed
to forge a consensus among global leaders, Obama plunged into a campaign on
radio and television to try to convince a skeptical U.S. public and Congress of
the need for a military strike on Syria.
Obama, clearly still the
reluctant warrior who rose to political prominence on his opposition to the
Iraq war, emphasized he favored limited strikes on Syria to deter future
chemical weapons attacks - not another costly and protracted conflict.
"This would not be another Iraq or
Afghanistan," Obama declared in his weekly radio address, previewing
arguments he will make in a nationally televised address on Tuesday.
Obama is seeking congressional approval for a
strike, but early vote-count estimates do not look encouraging for the
president, with scores of lawmakers still undecided. The Senate is expected to
take action next week. The House of Representatives will vote later, but the
time is not set.
The Obama administration says over 1,400 people
were killed by the poison gas, hundreds of them children. A recent
Reuters/Ipsos poll said 56 percent of Americans believed the United States
should not intervene in Syria; 19 percent backed action.
In Europe, pressure
increased for delay. European Union foreign ministers meeting in Lithuania on
Saturday blamed the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack in Syria on President
Bashar al-Assad's government. But they did not endorse military action and made
clear the bloc wanted the United Nations to have a role in agreeing on an
international response.
CNN:
As the White House cranked up its campaign, CNN
showed excerpts on Saturday from the gruesome aftermath of the attack taken
from a DVD shown to lawmakers and compiled from publicly available videos on
YouTube and other internet sites.
Pope Francis:
Pope Francis called Sunday for an
end to the illegal traffic in arms, and repeated his appeal for peace in Syria.
The call came hours after Francis
addressed an estimated 100,000 people in St Peter's Square in a day of fasting
and prayer aimed at encouraging peace in Syria.
"The violence and
devastation in Syria should stop immediately and we should work with renewed
commitment for a just solution to this fratricidal conflict," he said on
Sunday, calling for peace in Egypt, Iraq and Lebanon as well.
On the field:
Rebels including al-Qaeda-linked
fighters gained control of a Christian village northeast of the capital
Damascus, Syrian activists said Sunday. Government media provided a
dramatically different account of the battle suggesting regime forces were
winning.
It was impossible to independently
verify the reports from Maaloula, a scenic mountain community known for being
one of the few places in the world where residents still speak the ancient
Middle Eastern language of Aramaic. The village is on a UNESCO list of
tentative world heritage sites.
The rebel advance into the area this
week was spearheaded by the al-Nusra Front, exacerbating fears among Syrians
and religious minorities about the role played by Islamic extremists within the
rebel ranks.
Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the Nusra Front backed by another
group, the Qalamon Liberation Front, moved into the village after heavy clashes
with the army late Saturday.
He said pro-government fighters remain
inside the village, in hiding.
Initially, troops loyal to President
Bashar Assad moved into Maaloula early Saturday, he said, "but they left
when rebels started pouring into the village." Now, Abdurrahman said, the
army is surrounding the village and controlling its entrances and exits.
A Maaloula resident said the rebels,
many of them sporting beards and shouting Allahu Akbar, or God is great,
attacked Christian homes and churches shortly after moving into the village
overnight.
Syria's state SANA news agency said
the army reported "progress" in its offensive against the rebels in
Maaloula.
State-run TV reported that all
churches in Maaloula were now safe and the army was chasing gunmen in the
western hills.
REUTERS/AP
For the full report, please click on the VIDEO above