The White House dodged a direct question Thursday about whether the United States is offering to enter a new military agreement with Russia to coordinate attacks against the Islamic State and al Qaeda in Syria, saying only that such coordination is not taking place right now.
Still, the president’s top spokesman appeared to confirm that such a pact is under discussion.
“At present the United States is not conducting or coordinating military operations with Russia,” Josh Earnest said. “I know there is some speculation that an agreement will be reached to do so … it’s not clear that will happen.”
“It’s time for Russia to make some serious decisions about how they want to use their influence in Syria,” he added. “They have to decide whether they use their military to prop up the Assad regime or they use their military to go after extremists — our position is they can’t do both.”
The Washington Post on Thursday reported on a leaked U.S. proposal to offer Moscow military coordination in exchange for an agreement that they stop using their bombing campaigns to go after rebels trying to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad from power.
Secretary of State John Kerry is headed to Moscow Thursday to discuss the proposal with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
He declined to comment on the substance of the leaked proposal, saying only that “We’ll have plenty of time to talk about it and I’ll give you all a sense of where we are.”
