On April 22, 2014Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby gave a press briefing where he confirmed that the US and Saudi Arabia are continuing to “assist” Syrian rebels:
“Joe?
Q: Admiral Kirby, I have a question on Syria.
We have seen media reports lately that the Syrian regime has used again chemical weapons, sort of chlorine gas against some people. Have you seen those reports? Could you confirm them? What’s the Pentagon reaction on that?
REAR ADM. KIRBY: We’ve seen reporting about this alleged chemical use. I have nothing today to announce or to confirm about it except to say that as we have said all along, the Assad regime needs to stop the violence against their own people, particularly throughout — through the use of those kinds of weapons. But I can’t confirm the specific use of those weapons from those reports.
Q: Could you confirm that Saudi Arabia and the United States have both delivered anti-tank missiles to part of Syrian opposition? (Inaudible).
REAR ADM. KIRBY: What I’ll tell you is that we continue to support assisting a moderate opposition in Syria, but we’re not going to detail all the manner in which we’re going to deliver on that support, so I’m not going to confirm that”, said Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel (source: DOD http://www.defense.gov/Transcripts/Transcript.aspx?TranscriptID=5417 ).
We called the Pentagon who refused to confirm or deny any direct US weapons transfers to Syrian rebels affiliated with al-Qaeda.
Admiral Kirby could not be reached for clarification in this matter.
The White House also, not surprisingly “refused” to comment in this matter saying only “that the US doesn’t support terrorists in Syria or anywhere else.”
So much of freedom of the press.