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US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Friday that he expected to see a larger US civilian presence in Syria, including contractors and diplomats, as the fight against Islamic State militants nears its end and the focus turns toward rebuilding and ensuring the militants do not return. The United States has about 2,000 troops in Syria fighting Islamic State. Mattis’ comments are likely to anger Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has previously called US troops “illegal invader” forces. “What we will be doing is shifting from what I would call an offensive, shifting from an offensive terrain-seizing approach to a stabilizing… you’ll see more US diplomats on the ground,” Mattis said. He has previously stated that US forces will stay in Syria as long as Islamic State fighters want to fight and prevent the return of an “ISIS 2.0.” This is the first time he has said that there would be an increase of diplomats in the parts of the country retaken from Islamic State militants. “Well when you bring in more diplomats, they are working that initial restoration of services, they bring in the contractors, that sort of thing,” Mattis said. “There is international money that has got to be administered, so it actually does something, it doesn’t go into the wrong people’s pockets,” he added. The contractors and diplomats would also be looking at training local forces to clear improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and holding territory to help ensure that Islamic State does not retake territory. “It is an attempt to move towards the normalcy and that takes a lot of support,” said Mattis. It was not clear how many US diplomats would serve in Syria and when. The United States has suspended diplomatic relations with Syria due to the civil war.

  The dollar slipped to its lowest in more than three months against a basket of major currencies on Friday as the euro and sterling climbed, putting the greenback on track for an almost 10 per cent fall over the year - its worst showing since 2003. The dollar started 2017 on a high, with the index that tracks it against a basket of six major currencies hitting its strongest in 14 years on hopes that new US president Donald Trump would implement pro-growth, pro-inflation measures. But it has fallen back on doubts about Trump's ability to push through those policies. And it has also lost out as growth has picked up outside the United States, with other countries' central banks moving towards tighter monetary policy, lessening the gap between the Federal Reserve and others. “We are seeing synchronised global growth, in particular a very strong growth recovery in the euro area, which is leading the ECB (European Central Bank) to gradually normalise policy, which is helping the euro,” said Societe Generale currency strategist Alvin Tan. Tan added that the dollar had become overvalued against the euro, yen and sterling at the start of the year and so another part of the reason for its weakness in 2017 was a mean reversion in valuation.

Tags help you find and organize your bookmarks by letting you select all of your bookmarks with a certain tag or combination of tags. Quickly add relevant tags to a bookmark by clicking on any of the recommended tags that appear under the description field on the “Save Bookmark” pop-up. When you are satisfied with the information in the “Save Bookmark” pop-up, click the “Save Bookmark” button. Now a link to the page is stored in your Diigo library, and the information you entered is stored with it.

Highlight Highlighting lets you denote important information on a page, just like highlighting in a book, but with Diigo, the highlighted text will be conveniently saved to your library as well. There are some important things for me to denote on my recipe. My wife doesn’t like pineapple, my grandfather can’t have eggs or chocolate, and I don’t like coconut very much, so I highlight those items on the recipe to let me know I need to deal with them. Highlight by clicking “Highlight” on the Diigolet. Then select the text you want to highlight. The text will be visually highlighted and the text is now stored in your library. It’s that easy. Click the button again to exit highlighter mode. You can also change the color of a highlight by clicking the downward-pointing arrow next to “Highlight” and choosing a color. Colors are useful for differentiating different types of highlights. I will use a different color for each of the different people I need to consider.

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The United States on Monday warned it was ready to act in Syria if needed to end chemical attacks and “inhuman suffering” as it pushed for a new 30-day ceasefire in Eastern Ghouta at the United Nations Security Council The US ambassador [Nikki Haley] recalled that President Donald Trump had ordered missile strikes on a Syrian air base in April last year in retaliation for a sarin gas attack blamed on President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.

“We also warn any nation that is determined to impose its will through chemical attacks and inhuman suffering, most especially the outlaw Syrian regime: the United States remains prepared to act if we must,” Haley said. The Russian military at least is taking the threat seriously. The chief of Russia’s armed forces has issued a warning of his own: Moscow is ready to respond if lives of the Russian servicemen are endangered, including by strikes on Damascus, head of Russia’s General Staff Valery Gerasimov said. “There are many Russian advisers, representatives of the Russian Center for Reconciliation of Opposing Sides and [Russian] servicemen in Damascus and at Syrian defense facilities,” Gerasimov stated. In case lives of Russian military personnel are put in danger, the Russian Armed Forces will respond with certain measure to both “missiles” and “lauchers” which are delivering these projectiles.

What Gerasimov is saying here is two-fold: Any strikes in and around Damascus would almost certainly endanger Russian military personnel. If that were to happen, the Russian military will take measures against any missiles, and also against launch vehicles delivering the payload. Meaning, the Russians won’t be passively absorbing US strikes. Instead they will use their potent anti-air defenses, including against any manned aircraft.