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WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama's choice to be the first U.S. ambassador to Syria in five years told his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday he'll deliver "unfiltered straight talk" to Damascus about its support of terror groups.
"They need to hear directly from us," Robert Ford told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, whose chairman, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., promised swift action on the nomination.
"We must be talking every day and every week with top-level officials who have influence and decision-making authority," Ford said.
President George W. Bush withdrew a full-time ambassador from Syria in 2005 following terrorism accusations and to protest the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, killed in a Beirut truck bombing that his supporters blamed on Syria. Syria denied involvement.
Having served four years as deputy U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ford said, "I saw first-hand the tragic aftermath of terrorist car bombings perpetrated by foreign fighter networks that have infiltrated suicide bombers" over the Syrian border into Iraq.
He said Syria has been a steadfast supporter of terror groups like Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah for more than 20 years.
"Without significant changes in its policy, Syria will remain on our list of state supporters of terrorism for the foreseeable future," he said.
Kerry said large numbers of deadly weapons continue to cross Syria's border into Lebanon and that Hezbollah now has more dangerous rockets than it did before the 2006 war with Israel.
Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said, "We should temper expectations about what can be achieved diplomatically with the Syrians in the short term."
"Nevertheless, declining to post ambassadors to countries, though sometimes necessary, rarely serves U.S. interests for long. In this case, Syria is an unavoidable factor in the Middle East peace equation," Lugar said.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
