G-20 Ends, EU Declares ‘No Military Solution’ to Syria

Echoes Russian Calls for Diplomatic Solution Through UN

The G-20 summit has now come and gone, and President Obama’s efforts to gain international support for his planned war on Syria appears to have fallen well short of its goals, with the European Union coming out publicly against the conflict.

Echoing the Russian position, EU officials declared that there was no “military solution” to the ongoing civil war in Syria, and that attacking Syria would not resolve the situation.

Instead, the EU officials say, they want a diplomatic solution negotiated through the United Nations. This would presumably be the Geneva II plan, which the US and Russia were planning over the summer, but which the US has no abandoned in favor of lobbing missiles.

France had been lobbying the European Union to endorse the war, as had British Prime Minister David Cameron, though neither has secured the support of their own parliament for the war, and appear to have faced overwhelming opposition from the rest of the EU.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.