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US, France and Britain launch strikes on Syria

Damascus: The United States, Britain and France carried out a wave of strikes against Bashar al-Assad's Syrian regime on Saturday in response to alleged chemical weapons attacks that President Donald Trump branded the "crimes of a monster."
As Trump embarked on a White House address to announce the action - taken in defiance of Russian warnings - explosions were heard in the Syrian capital Damascus, signalling a new chapter in a brutal seven-year-old civil war.
After dawn, Syrians draped in government flags descended on the heart of the capital in a show of defiance against the strikes.
Trump said he had ordered US forces to launch precision strikes "on targets associated with the chemical weapons capabilities of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad."
Syrian surface-to-air missile batteries had attempted to fire back, but there were no initial reports of losses, he added.
Syrian state media said air defences were activated to block the attack and published images of smoke clouds hanging over the capital.
Syria's foreign ministry denounced the strikes as a "brutal, barbaric aggression" and suggested they were aimed at "hindering" the work of inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons due to start in Damascus later on Saturday.
British Prime Minister Theresa May issued a statement saying the attacks were a response to "circumstances of pure horror."
In a statement, French President Emmanuel Macron said, "Our response has been limited to the Syrian regimes facilities enabling the production and deployment of chemical weapons."
French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said on Saturday that missile strikes carried out overnight in Syria by Britain, France and the US had destroyed a "large part" of the Damascus government's stocks of chemical weapons.
Russia's defence ministry said more than 100 cruise missiles and air-to-land missiles had been fired and that "a significant number" were shot down.
It said that none of the Western strikes in Syria had hit areas covered by Russia's air defences around its Hmeimim airbase and naval facility in Tartus.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has denounced a strike on Syria launched by the United States and its allies as an "act of aggression" that will exacerbate humanitarian catastrophe in Syria.
In a statement issued by the Kremlin, the Russian leader says Moscow is calling an emergency meeting of the United Nations' Security Council over the strike launched by the US, Britain and France.
China opposed the joint attack by the US, France and the UK on Syria, saying any action bypassing the UN charter violates the principles of international law and the basic norms governing international relations
President Bashar al-Assad told his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani that a U.S.-led attack on Saturday would increase Syria's resolve to "fight and crush terrorism in every inch" of the country. Rouhani told Assad that Iran would continue to stand by Syria.
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